Chapter 5 - The Betrayal at the Gates
The snow fell faster now, turning into a blinding blizzard that blanketed the estate grounds in deep white drift.
Inside the master nursery at the estate, I was sitting near the crib, gently stroking Emma’s soft hair as she drifted off to sleep. Two of James’s security operators were stationed downstairs in the living room, their heavy footsteps occasionally echoing through the floorboards.
The house felt safe. Protected. An impenetrable fortress.
Until the front doorbell rang.
I stiffened, my hand hovering over Emma’s back. Downstairs, I heard the faint sound of boots moving toward the foyer, followed by the muffled voice of the lead guard through the security intercom.
“Ma'am,” the guard’s voice came over my hand-held radio a moment later. “It’s your father. He’s at the front gate. He’s crying, ma'am. He says he needs to see you right now.”
My stomach churned with a toxic mixture of anger and anxiety. My father? After everything that had happened at dinner? After the way he had defended Lauren?
“Tell him to go away,” I spoke into the radio, my voice tight. “James told us not to open the gates for anyone.”
“Maya... please,” my father’s desperate voice broke through the radio speaker, trembling and cracked with weeping. “I know what Lauren did. I know about the debts. She told me everything before James’s men took her away! Please, sweetheart... I just want to make sure you and Emma are safe. I have information about the men she was working with!”
I hesitated. A terrible, tragic weakness inside me—the part of me that still loved the father who used to carry me on his shoulders—made me hesitate.
“Bring him into the foyer,” I instructed the guard reluctantly. “But do not let him past the security doors until I come down.”
“Copy that, ma'am.”
I checked Emma once more, ensured the nursery’s reinforced steel door was locked from the outside with a electronic keypad, and walked down the grand curved staircase toward the foyer.
My father was standing near the fireplace, wrapped in his heavy winter coat, his hat in his hands, his face pale and sunken. He looked ten years older than he had three hours ago at the Christmas dinner table.
“Maya,” he choked out, stepping forward with open arms. “Oh, thank God you’re alright...”
“Stop right there, Dad,” I said, keeping five feet of distance between us, my arms crossed tightly over my chest. “Why are you here?”
“I came to apologize,” he wept, wiping his eyes with a handkerchief. “I was weak, Maya. I’ve been protecting Lauren her whole life because I thought I could fix her. I didn't know she had gotten involved with dangerous people! I didn't know she brought them to your family!”
“She sold us out, Dad!” I shouted, my voice trembling with raw, emotional agony. “She let a murderer threaten my daughter!”
“I know... I know,” my father sobbed, dropping to his knees on the marble floor, burying his face in his hands. “I’m so sorry, Maya. I’m so sorry...”
My heart softened slightly seeing my proud, stubborn father on his knees, weeping like a broken man. I took two slow steps toward him, reaching out a hand to touch his shoulder.
“Dad... get up...” I whispered.
Suddenly, my father’s weeping stopped.
He didn't look up. He reached into his deep winter coat pocket and pulled out a small, metallic cylinder with a glass window—a military-grade chemical smoke grenade.
Before I could react, before the guard in the hallway could raise his weapon, my father pulled the pin and dropped the cylinder onto the marble floor.
HISSSSSS.
A thick, blinding cloud of sweet-smelling gray gas erupted instantly, filling the entire foyer in less than three seconds.
I gasped, taking a breath of the dense air, and instantly my vision swam. My knees buckled beneath me as a wave of intense paralysis washed through my muscles.
The lead guard dropped his rifle with a heavy clatter, collapsing onto his side, unconscious before he even hit the floor.
Through the thick, swirling gray fog, I saw my father stand up slowly. He wasn't crying anymore. His face was cold, emotionless, devoid of any regret.
Behind him, the heavy oak front doors swung open.
A tall man in a long leather coat stepped through the smoke, holding a heavy suppressed pistol. His face was covered in silver burn scars along his jawline—Richard Vance.
“Good job, Arthur,” Vance said, his cold, rasping voice echoing through my fading consciousness. “Your daughter’s debts are officially cleared.”
My father looked down at me as I lay paralyzed on the cold floor, unable to move my arms, unable to scream, unable to protect my baby upstairs.
“I’m sorry, Maya,” my father whispered coldly. “Lauren is my favorite. She always was.”
May you like
Vance walked past me, his heavy leather boots clicking against the marble as he headed straight toward the stairs leading up to Emma’s nursery.
“No...” I tried to scream, but only a silent, pathetic gasp escaped my lips as the dark, cold oblivion finally swallowed me whole.
