Chapter 4 - the silent surveillance
By the fourth morning, a subtle, suffocating shift had taken over the Cole estate.
Emma moved through the long corridors with her pale-pink uniform, sweeping the oak paneling and polishing the silver fixtures, but everywhere she turned, Adrian's guards were watching. Two broad-shouldered men in dark suits stood near the servant kitchen, while Marcus personally monitored the east wing courtyard where Nora played with her wooden toys.
In the master study, Adrian stood before a wall of security monitors displaying live feeds from every corner of the property.
His phone buzzed on the desk. He picked it up instantly. "Speak."
Marcus’s voice came through the speaker, low and tense. "Boss, we pulled the archived records from the Hartford hospital. Four years ago, the private room for Emma Hayes was paid in cash under a corporate shell company registered in Panama."
Adrian’s jaw set like iron. "Whose shell company?"
"It belonged to your uncle, Dominic Cole," Marcus revealed. "The same uncle who tried to seize control of the New Haven docks right after James died."
Adrian’s eyes narrowed into twin points of icy, lethal focus. His late uncle Dominic had been a ruthless snake inside the family, a man Adrian had personally driven out of Connecticut three years ago.
"Dominic knew about the child?" Adrian asked, his deep voice dropping into a hollow register.
"Dominic was paying Emma's rent for the first six months after James was killed," Marcus said. "He kept her hidden from you, boss. He was holding the child as a secret leverage chip in case you ever moved against his territory."
Adrian gripped the phone so tightly the casing groaned under his broad palm. The pieces of the dark puzzle were finally coming together. James hadn't just died in a random alleyway robbery five years ago—he had been set up by their own uncle, and Emma had been forced into hiding to keep James's newborn daughter from being executed as a bloodline heir.
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Suddenly, a loud crash echoed from the main driveway outside!
The glass windows of the study rattled as tires screeched across the wet gravel, followed by the sharp, metallic crunch of the front iron gate being forced open!
