Chapter 5 - The Door Begins to Turn
The door handle turned slowly.
Travis stepped between Eleanor and the door without thinking.
The movement surprised both of them.
He was furious with her.
Horrified by her.
Maybe afraid of what she was.
But someone outside the room was trying to enter before the truth could be spoken, and instinct put him in the way.
Eleanor saw the movement and began crying harder.
“Don’t stand there.”
“Why?”
“Because they won’t hurt me first.”
The sentence emptied the room.
Travis stared at her.
“What did you just say?”
The handle stopped.
A voice outside said nothing.
No entry.
No explanation.
Just silence.
Travis reached for the smartphone on the nightstand.
Eleanor caught his wrist.
“Please.”
He looked down at her hand.
Same hand that wore a wedding ring.
Same hand that had pushed money toward him.
Same hand that had stopped him from seeing the photograph.
He pulled free, but not violently.
“Tell me who they are.”
Her voice broke.
“Security.”
“For who?”
She swallowed.
“For the people who arranged this meeting before I turned it into a wedding.”
Travis’s face went blank.
“A meeting?”
She looked ashamed.
“It was supposed to be a conversation.”
“With a million dollars?”
“With a way out.”
The handle turned again, harder this time.
Travis shouted toward the door.
“Stay out.”
The movement stopped.
Eleanor looked terrified.
“You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Maybe I’m done being managed.”
That sentence changed her face.
A strange grief entered it.
As if she had waited years to hear him say something like that.
Travis noticed.
His anger sharpened.
“You know me.”
Eleanor looked away.
“Not the way I should.”
He lifted the envelope again.
“Then I’m opening this.”
She did not stop him this time.
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But her body stiffened as though the photograph had already begun to speak.
Read Chapter 6 👉 Because the man outside paused when Travis commanded him, and that made Travis realize the room’s power was not where he thought it was.
