Chapter 2
Rose smiled faintly.
“You could ask her.”
Adrian did not.
But he stopped complaining about the cup.
Something else changed.
Emily stopped looking terrified every time she entered his study to collect her daughter.
One rainy evening, she found Adrian on the floor helping Lily assemble a wooden puzzle.
Emily paused at the door.
“You know that piece is upside down.”
Adrian looked at her.
“It fits.”
“It absolutely does not.”
Lily giggled.
Adrian examined the piece.
Emily was right.
He turned it around.
“There.”
Emily smiled.
It was not flirtation.
Not even gratitude.
Just a tired young woman witnessing something unexpectedly gentle.
Yet Adrian remembered that smile long after she left.
Three nights later, Lily developed a fever.
Emily had spent most of the evening cooling her forehead, coaxing her to drink water and checking the thermometer every twenty minutes.
At 2:43 a.m., Lily woke coughing.
“Mama, my throat hurts.”
“I know, baby.”
“Mr. Buttons hurts too.”
“I’ll make sure he gets medicine.”
The children’s fever reducer in Emily’s cabinet was nearly empty.
Rose kept additional medicine downstairs in the household first-aid pantry.
Emily tucked the blankets around Lily.
“I’m going downstairs for two minutes.”
“No.”
Lily reached for her.
Emily kissed her forehead.
“I promise I’m coming right back.”
She placed Mr. Buttons beneath Lily’s arm.
“You watch her for me.”
Lily nodded sleepily.
Emily slipped into the corridor.
The mansion after midnight felt nothing like the mansion during the day.
Without footsteps and telephones, the enormous house seemed to be holding its breath.
Emily was approaching the rear service stairs when she heard a voice.
Victor Hale.
She recognized him immediately.
Everyone did.
Victor had worked beside Adrian longer than almost anyone.
Emily should have kept walking.
May you like
Instead, one sentence stopped her.
“Mercer will be at....?"
