Chapter 2 - The Quiet Witness
While Rory’s high-priced security guards swept the perimeter with thermal cameras and metal detectors, and while the medical specialists packed their bags in disgrace, someone else was quietly working in the shadows of the Starks estate.
Her name was Maeve.
She had been hired three weeks ago through an agency in Manhattan. Soft-spoken, impeccably neat, and perpetually invisible, Maeve moved through the twelve-bedroom mansion like a ghost. While other maids gossiped about the terrifying reputation of Rory Starks—the whispered rumors of midnight shipments, blood money, and rival cartels—Maeve kept her head down and her ears open.
She didn’t care about Rory’s empire. She cared about the children.
At two-fifty in the morning, the mansion was plunged into an eerie, dead quiet. The ocean breeze outside battered the tall windows of the Long Island estate, rattling the glass.
Maeve stood in the second-floor linen closet, folding crisp white sheets. From down the hall, she heard the muffled, frantic pacing of Rory’s heavy boots. He was doing his nightly vigil outside the nursery door, a cigar burning down to his knuckles, his jaw clenched so tight a muscle ticked continuously in his cheek.
Maeve glanced at the antique wall clock in the hallway.
Two fifty-eight.
Two minutes until hell broke loose.
She set the folded linens down, wiped her hands on her apron, and walked silently toward the nursery. Her rubber-soled shoes made no sound on the imported Persian rug.
As she approached, Rory turned sharply, his hand instinctively dropping toward the concealed holster beneath his tailored jacket. When he saw it was only the quiet maid, his shoulders slumped in exhaustion.
“Go back downstairs, Maeve,” Rory rasped, his voice rough from lack of sleep. “It’s about to start. I don’t want you in here.”
“Mr. Starks,” Maeve said softly, her voice remarkably steady despite facing the most feared man on the East Coast. “The doctors checked the walls. They checked the outlets. They checked the air.”
“And they were all useless,” Rory interrupted bitterly.
“Yes, sir. Because they were looking everywhere except where the girls are looking.”
Rory narrowed his eyes, studying her. In the dim amber glow of the hallway sconce, Maeve’s eyes were sharp, calculating, and entirely unafraid. It was a look he rarely saw in anyone outside his inner circle of hardened enforcers.
“What are you talking about?” Rory demanded.
Before Maeve could answer, the grandfather clock downstairs struck three.
Bong. Bong. Bong.
From inside the nursery, the piercing, blood-curdling screams began.
It wasn’t just crying. It was the sound of absolute terror—two little girls screaming as if their chests were being ripped open from the inside.
Rory shoved past Maeve, flinging the nursery door wide open.
Inside, the scene was identical to every night for the past two months. Lily was clawing at her ears, tearing skin away in frantic strips, screaming that her head was on fire. Rose was writhing on the bed, her body convulsing, clutching her temples.
And right between them, sitting upright against the pillows, was Mr. Honey, the golden-brown teddy bear.
Rory lunged forward, sweeping his daughters into his arms, trying to shield them from whatever unseen horror was plaguing them. But as he lifted them, the screaming only intensified. They thrashed against him, their small bodies burning with an unnatural fever.
Standing in the doorway, Maeve didn’t rush to help console them. Instead, her gaze locked onto the bed.
May you like
Specifically, onto the teddy bear.
As the wind howled outside, Maeve watched something impossible. A faint, high-pitched static hiss—barely audible beneath the girls' screams—seemed to emanate directly from the plush toy’s chest.
