Chapter 5
The ladder became the hardest part.
Mia looked at it like it was a wall.
Dominic understood.
The ladder was how she had been taken down.
Or how Nathan had left her there.
Either way, it had become part of the fear.
Dominic turned to his guards.
“Rope harness from the north utility room. Medical kit. Water. Now.”
Two men moved instantly.
Nathan shifted at the hatch.
“I can get the kit.”
“No,” Dominic said.
One word.
Nathan stopped.
For the first time, the command did not sound like leadership between allies.
It sounded like a door closing.
Mia rested against the stone wall, Dominic’s jacket around her shoulders. The black fabric swallowed her torn cream cardigan. She looked smaller in it, but safer.
Above them, Harper’s voice trembled.
“Mommy?”
Mia looked up.
“I’m here, baby.”
Harper sobbed.
That sound cut through every man in the foyer.
Even the guards looked away.
Nathan did not.
He watched Mia too carefully.
Not like a man relieved she was alive.
Like a man assessing how much damage a witness could still cause.
Dominic saw that too.
His anger became colder.
“Why would she lie?” Dominic asked without looking away from Mia.
Nathan answered too quickly.
“She may think I’m responsible because I argued with her.”
Mia’s head lifted.
“You argued?”
Nathan leaned into the opening.
“Mia, you were upset. You were threatening to leave with Harper—”
Dominic’s eyes snapped upward.
Mia whispered, “No.”
Nathan continued, “You said things. You weren’t thinking clearly.”
Mia’s fear turned to rage for one flickering second.
“I was trying to tell him about you.”
The foyer went silent.
Dominic did not speak.
Nathan did.
Again, too fast.
“About what?”
Mia looked at Dominic now.
Her lips were cracked.
Her voice weak.
But her eyes were suddenly clear.
“The papers in the east study.”
Nathan’s face went blank.
Dominic saw it.
Not confusion.
Recognition forced still.
Mia added, “He found me reading them.”
Nathan stepped back from the hatch.
The guards stepped with him.
Dominic’s voice remained low.
May you like
“Nobody goes near the east study.”
Read Chapter 6 👉 Because Mia had not been locked beneath the mansion by accident; she had seen something Nathan needed buried.
