Chapter 4 - THE MIDNIGHT ESCAPE
Without thinking, Mia threw open the balcony doors and leaped into the pouring rain, dropping onto the muddy lawn fifteen feet below.
Pain shot through her ankle as she hit the ground, but adrenaline overruled the injury. Sprints of light flared behind her as flashlight beams cut through the darkness.
"She was in the room! Kill her!" Julian shouted from the balcony.
Mia scrambled into the dense woods surrounding the mansion estate, branches whipping her face and tears blinding her eyes. She heard heavy footsteps crashing through the brush behind her, accompanied by the muffled thwip-thwip of silenced gunshots tearing through the leaves around her head.
She ran blindly toward the estate's perimeter fence. Remembering an old drainage culvert that ran beneath the iron security bars, she dropped to her knees and dragged herself through the muddy, filth-ridden pipe, scraping her arms against the jagged concrete.
She emerged on the other side near the main highway just as a black sedan splashed through a puddle. Panicking, Mia threw herself into the middle of the road, waving her arms frantically.
The car screeched to a halt, stopping inches from her body. The driver's door opened, and a man stepped out into the rain with his gun drawn.
It was Detective Thomas Sterling.
"Mia?!" Sterling called out, shocked. "What the hell are you doing out here?"
"They're trying to kill me!" Mia sobbed, falling to her knees in the road. "Julian and Victoria! They poisoned Emily with a paralytic! They planned to cremate her! You have to save her!"
Sterling lowered his weapon and rushed over, pulling her up into the passenger seat of his car. "Take a breath. Tell me everything."
Inside the warm car, Mia spilled every detail—the whispered conversation in the study, Victoria’s involvement, the paralytic compound, and Dr. Thorne’s forced compliance.
Sterling listened in stony silence, his jaw set hard. When she finished, he reached into his glove compartment and pulled out a small recorder, clicking it off.
"I'm glad you came to me, Mia," Sterling said quietly. His voice had lost its professional tone. It was flat. Cold.
May you like
Mia looked at him, a sudden wave of dread washing over her. "Detective... why do you have a recorder?"
Sterling turned to her with a slow, chilling smile. "Because Julian pays very well to know who is talking to the police. And you, Mia... talk far too much."
