Chapter 6 - THE RAT IN THE SUITI didn't panic. For eighteen months, I had survived in a house with a man who could snap at any second. I had learned how to move silently, how to react without fear, and how to think three steps ahead.
I grabbed Celeste’s diary, thrust the silver key into my pocket, and slipped out the back kitchen door just as the heavy front oak doors were shoved open.
I crouched behind the thick hydrangeas in the garden, listening through the open window as their heavy footsteps echoed in the foyer.
“Check the fireplace!” my father’s voice barked inside. “Grant said the diary was hidden behind the marriage portrait!”
“If the girl found it, Arthur, we have a major problem,” Vance’s voice replied.
My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. Special Agent Vance was my father’s man all along. The entire raid two nights ago wasn't a triumph of justice—it was a controlled military operation orchestrated by my father to eliminate the Sterling family before they could expose him, using the FBI as his personal cleanup crew.
“She couldn't have opened it,” Dad said coldly. “The code requires the ER date. She’s too foolish to remember that.”
“Don't underestimate your daughter, Arthur,” Vance warned. “She played Grant for eighteen months right under his nose. She copied his ledgers.”
“She’s a broken girl!” Dad shouted, his voice echoing with a bitter, terrifying authority I had never heard before. “I made sure of it! I picked Grant because I knew he was an abusive psychopath! I knew he would keep her so terrified and battered that she would never look into the family finances! She was supposed to stay quiet until the merger was complete!”
Hearing those words from my own father cut deeper than any fist Grant had ever landed on my face.
My mother had died when I was ten. I had spent my entire life believing Arthur Montgomery was my protector, my rock, my hero. But to him, I was never a daughter. I was a tool. A piece of collateral damage designed to be abused into submission so his billion-dollar treason could remain hidden.
“She’s not in the house!” a mercenary shouted from upstairs. “The back window in the study is unlocked!”
“Find her!” Dad screamed. “She has the diary and the key! If those hit the press or the federal prosecutor in D.C., we are all going to spend the rest of our lives in a maximum-security prison! KILL HER IF YOU HAVE TO!”
I didn't wait to hear another word.
I turned and sprinted into the dense, dark woods behind the estate, the cold branches whipping across my face, tearing at my clothes. Rain began to fall again, mixing with the hot tears streaming down my cheeks.
I ran until my lungs burned, until my legs felt like lead, until the flashing lights of the estate disappeared behind the thick canopy of trees.
I emerged onto a quiet secondary highway two miles away. I pulled out my phone, popped out the SIM card, and threw it into the drainage ditch. I hailed a passing taxi, sliding into the dark backseat, shivering and covered in mud.
“Where to, miss?” the driver asked, looking at me nervously in the rear-view mirror.
May you like
I pulled out the silver key with the brass tag, staring at the stamped text.
“742 Oakridge Drive,” I said, my voice cold, calm, and utterly devoid of fear. “And step on it.”
