Chapter 2 - LILY HAD BEEN KEEPING A SECOND RECORD
Serena spent the night in a police interview room.
She was not charged with everything Victor wanted.
Not yet.
The visible assault supported immediate child-endangerment and assault investigation.
The forged caregiver documents raised separate questions.
The guardianship draft was not a crime by itself.
The medication bottle required forensic review.
Victor hated the pace.
Detective Mara Chen did not care.
“You want a clean case?”
“Yes.”
“Then stop trying to move faster than evidence.”
Victor stared.
Nobody spoke to him like that.
Mara did.
He respected it immediately.
Ethan remained in the pediatric unit with his arm immobilized.
Lily had abdominal bruising but no internal injury.
She wanted to go back to work.
Victor laughed once.
“No.”
Her face tightened.
“I need the job.”
“You need rest.”
“I need rent.”
He stopped.
Of course.
He had forgotten that a day away from work could mean something different to someone without wealth.
“You’re paid.”
Lily looked embarrassed.
“That isn’t—”
“It is not charity.”
He sat across from her.
“You were injured protecting my son while employed in my home.”
She looked down.
He continued:
“You are paid.”
Then softer:
“And if you don’t want to return after this, you still are.”
Lily looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because I failed to make the house safe.”
The sentence surprised them both.
She did not absolve him.
“Okay.”
Good.
Victor needed less comfort and more truth.
Mara returned with Lily’s phone.
“You said you kept dates.”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
Lily hesitated.
Victor noticed.
“What?”
She looked at Mara, not him.
“Can I speak to you alone?”
Victor’s chest tightened.
He stood.
“Of course.”
He left.
That mattered.
Mara closed the door.
Lily reached into the lining of her bag and removed a tiny memory card.
“I recorded some things.”
Mara frowned.
“Audio?”
“Yes.”
“Video?”
“Some.”
“Why hide it from Victor?”
Lily’s hands shook.
“Because I didn’t know if someone in his house was helping Serena.”
Good.
Mara took the card carefully.
“Did you record private bedrooms?”
“No.”
“Bathrooms?”
“No.”
“Mostly nursery when I was present. Hallways. My room.”
“Were you part of conversations?”
“Usually.”
Legal admissibility would be reviewed.
But evidentiary value mattered.
“What made you start?”
Lily looked toward Ethan’s room.
“Serena told me one day that if Victor ever chose the baby over her, she would make sure there was no baby to choose.”
Mara went still.
“When?”
“Two months ago.”
“Exact words?”
Lily nodded.
“I wrote them down the same night.”
“Did you record that?”
“No.”
“Anything close?”
“Yes.”
Mara inserted the card into a forensic reader.
First audio.
Nursery.
Ethan crying.
Serena’s voice:
Stop performing.
Lily:
He’s teething.
Serena:
He cries because you reward him.
Lily:
He’s fourteen months old.
Serena:
And already manipulative like his mother.
Mara paused.
“His mother.”
Lily looked down.
“Isabella.”
Victor’s late wife.
She died when Ethan was four months old.
Car accident.
Lily never met her.
But Serena hated her anyway.
Next recording.
Serena:
Victor needs to move on.
Lily:
Ethan is not stopping him.
Serena:
You’d be surprised what a dead woman can do through a child.
Mara’s face tightened.
Next.
Hallway.
Serena talking to someone on phone.
Serena:
No, I can’t do it before the engagement announcement.
Pause.
Serena:
Because if the boy is injured too badly before I have household authority, Victor will ask questions.
Mara stopped.
Lily’s face went pale.
“I forgot that one was so clear.”
“Do you know who she was speaking to?”
“No.”
“Date?”
Lily checked notes.
Six weeks ago.
Before engagement was publicly announced.
Serena continued on recording:
After marriage, everything is easier.
Pause.
He trusts paperwork more than staff.
Mara looked up.
Victor had accepted clinic injury reports he never saw because household office handled them.
Paperwork.
Lily continued.
“I also photographed bruises.”
Time-stamped.
Mara had enough to expand the investigation.
She called Victor back only after copying the card.
He entered.
“What did she have?”
Mara looked at Lily.
Her decision.
Lily nodded.
Mara played the phone-call recording.
Victor did not move.
After marriage, everything is easier.
He trusts paperwork more than staff.
The words landed.
He looked at Lily.
“You heard this six weeks ago.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you come to me directly?”
“I tried to get into your office.”
Victor frowned.
“When?”
“The next morning.”
“What happened?”
“Gabriel stopped me.”
Silence.
Victor’s face changed.
“Gabriel Stone.”
“Yes.”
His security chief.
“He said you were in a federal strategy meeting and staff were not allowed near you.”
“That was true.”
Lily continued:
“I said it was about Ethan.”
“What did he do?”
“He told me to report through household office.”
Serena.
Victor closed his eyes.
“Did he know what you were going to say?”
“No.”
Maybe.
“Did you try later?”
“Yes.”
“Serena moved me to night shifts for a week.”
“So we didn’t cross.”
“Yes.”
Victor felt sick.
His own house had been designed around layers.
Security.
Staff hierarchy.
Schedulers.
Assistants.
He called that efficiency.
It also meant someone could control access to him.
Mara said:
“We’re checking Gabriel.”
Victor nodded.
No defensive loyalty.
Good.
Then Mara played another video.
Lily had placed her phone in the nursery bookshelf while folding clothes.
Serena entered.
Ethan sat in his playpen.
Serena looked around.
Then crouched.
“Say Mama.”
Ethan babbled.
Serena smiled.
“Say Serena.”
Lily’s voice off-camera:
He barely says two words.
Serena looked at her.
“He’ll learn.”
Then she picked up a framed photograph of Isabella holding newborn Ethan.
She stared.
“Soon he won’t remember her.”
Victor’s hands tightened.
Serena placed the photo face down.
Video continued.
She opened a drawer.
Removed a sealed envelope.
Lily had not seen the contents.
Serena slipped it into her purse.
Victor froze.
“That drawer belonged to Isabella.”
“What?”
“Personal documents.”
Mara asked:
“What was likely in the envelope?”
Victor thought.
“One of Isabella’s insurance packets.”
Mara looked at him.
“What kind?”
He frowned.
“Life insurance and trust documents.”
Serena took it six weeks ago.
Why?
Victor called his attorney.
Isabella’s death benefit had gone to Ethan’s trust.
Already paid.
But one supplemental family-trust policy remained unresolved because it depended on whether her death was accidental.
Car accident had been ruled accidental.
So why unresolved?
The policy was not ordinary life insurance.
It insured a private trust Isabella inherited.
If Isabella died due criminal action by anyone connected to the Blackwood household, a special protective clause removed Blackwood family control and placed assets under an external trustee for Ethan.
Victor stared.
“Why would she have that?”
His attorney answered:
“Her father insisted when she married you.”
Of course.
Blackwood name.
Risk.
If Isabella was murdered by someone connected to Victor’s organization, Ethan’s maternal assets moved out of Blackwood control.
If accidental, they remained in a combined family structure Victor administered until Ethan turned twenty-one.
Value?
Eighty million.
Victor felt cold.
Mara asked:
“Who benefits from combined structure?”
“Ethan.”
“Who controls voting rights while minor?”
Victor.
“And if Victor becomes unavailable?”
The designated guardian.
Silence.
Serena’s guardianship draft.
Now it connected.
If she became guardian and Victor became unavailable, she could control Ethan’s combined Blackwood and Isabella trust interests.
But why steal the insurance packet?
Maybe it contained evidence Isabella’s death was not accidental.
Victor stared.
“Find that envelope.”
Police searched Serena’s room.
No envelope.
But they found a photograph.
Isabella’s wrecked car.
Not public.
Taken before emergency crews arrived.
Time stamp seven minutes after crash.
Victor’s chest tightened.
“Who took this?”
No answer.
Back of photo:
WE WARNED HER.
Mara looked at Victor.
“Did Isabella receive threats?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Many.”
“From Serena?”
“No.”
“Who?”
“Business rivals.”
His world.
Mara continued.
“Did Serena know Isabella before you?”
Victor froze.
“What?”
“She may have.”
Employment records.
Serena worked for Montigue Strategic Consulting.
Isabella’s family used them for security review two years before the crash.
Victor stared.
“She never told me.”
Serena claimed she met Victor at a charity dinner nine months after Isabella died.
Maybe she had already met Isabella.
Mara found invoices.
One project:
BLACKWOOD MATERNAL RISK ASSESSMENT.
Client:
Isabella Blackwood.
Consultant assigned:
Serena Montigue.
Silence.
Victor felt the floor shift.
His fiancée had worked for his wife before she died.
Lily whispered:
“She hated her.”
Maybe not jealousy after death.
History.
Mara obtained archived emails.
Isabella to Serena:
I asked you to identify who is leaking Ethan’s schedules. Stop contacting Victor directly.
Serena:
You hired me because you believed someone inside his security team was compromised.
Isabella:
I hired the firm. Not you personally.
Serena:
Then perhaps you should ask why they assigned me.
Victor stared.
His late wife had investigated a leak in his security before her death.
Who?
No answer.
Then another email.
Isabella:
If anything happens to me, the nursery file goes to Lily Harper.
Victor stopped breathing.
“Lily?”
Everyone looked at her.
She went white.
“I never met her.”
Isabella died ten months ago.
Lily started work six months ago.
Impossible.
Unless Isabella knew who Lily was before Lily joined.
Mara turned.
“Why would she name you?”
Lily looked terrified.
“I don’t know.”
Victor stared.
Then Mara searched Lily’s employment background.
Her application came through a placement agency.
Who referred her?
Anonymous donor-sponsored placement scholarship for domestic workers.
Funding source:
ISABELLA FOUNDATION.
Silence.
Victor looked at Lily.
“You were placed in my house.”
She shook her head.
“I applied to ten jobs.”
“One of them was mine.”
“Yes.”
“Agency chose.”
“I thought.”
Mara checked.
Internal note:
Candidate priority requested by client estate.
Client contact:
S. MONTIGUE.
Serena had selected Lily.
But Isabella’s email named Lily before Isabella died.
How?
Lily’s face changed.
“My mother.”
“What?”
“My mother worked for Isabella’s family.”
Victor went still.
“Name?”
“Rachel Harper.”
Mara searched.
Rachel Harper.
Former private nurse to Isabella’s mother.
Died three years ago.
Isabella would have known her.
Maybe Lily as a child.
Lily whispered:
“My mother always said if I ever worked for wealthy families, never trust the person who controls the doors.”
Victor closed his eyes.
Isabella may have selected Lily as a future safeguard through family connection.
Serena later brought her into the house believing she could control her.
Two women.
Same choice.
Different reasons.
Then Mara’s phone rang.
The missing insurance envelope had been found.
Not in Serena’s room.
In Gabriel Stone’s office.
Victor’s security chief.
Inside:
a flash drive.
Label in Isabella’s handwriting:
IF I DIE, VICTOR MUST WATCH THIS BEFORE HE MARRIES SERENA.
May you like
Silence.
Victor stopped breathing.
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