Chapter 2 - The Locked East Wing
Clara was taken to St. Catherine's Hospital under police protection. Sebastian rode beside her in the ambulance, holding her hand as the city lights slid over the windows. Every few minutes the monitor sounded and Clara's fingers tightened around his. The baby remained stable, but her blood pressure was dangerously high.
She apologized twice for ruining the banquet.
The second time, Sebastian leaned close enough that she could see the hurt in his eyes.
"You did not ruin anything," he said. "I ruined our marriage when I kept dismissing your fear because it was easier to believe my mother than to question her."
Clara looked away.
That answer did not forgive him, and he knew it.
At the hospital, Dr. Adrian Cole appeared before the police had finished securing the maternity floor. He arrived in a dark overcoat, carrying a leather medical bag, his expression arranged into practiced concern.
"Clara," he said, moving toward the bed. "I heard there was an incident."
Detective Quinn stepped between them.
"You will not examine her."
Cole blinked. "I am her physician."
"Not anymore," Clara said.
It was the first decision she made without looking toward Sebastian.
Cole's gaze shifted to the monitor and then to Clara's chart. His interest was too sharp. Sebastian saw it.
Quinn showed him a copy of the guardianship petition. "Did you sign the supporting declaration?"
Cole adjusted his cuff. "I cannot discuss a patient's mental health in a hallway."
"You can discuss whether your signature is authentic."
He studied the page for less than a second. "It appears to be."
Clara began to shake.
Sebastian moved beside her, but she raised a hand, stopping him. "Ask him about the medication."
Cole's calm expression tightened.
For weeks, Clara explained, Eleanor had insisted that Dr. Cole prescribed vitamins in unmarked capsules. They made Clara drowsy, confused, and unable to remember entire afternoons. When she stopped taking them, Eleanor accused her of endangering the baby. Two days later, Clara's phone disappeared, and the household staff were ordered not to let her leave alone.
Cole denied prescribing anything unmarked.
Quinn asked for his phone.
He refused.
Before the detective could press further, a nurse entered carrying Clara's bloodwork. The preliminary toxicology screen showed traces of a sedative not recommended during late pregnancy.
Cole's face changed.
Only slightly, but enough.
He backed toward the hallway. "This discussion is over. My attorney will contact you."
Quinn signaled to the officers, but the fire alarm screamed through the building. Red lights flashed. Doors released. Nurses moved patients into the corridor. In the confusion, Cole vanished down a service stairwell.
The alarm was false.
Security footage later showed a man in maintenance clothing pulling the alarm seconds before Cole left the floor.
At dawn, Sebastian returned to Vale House with Quinn and a warrant team. Rain had stopped, leaving the gardens black and shining. Eleanor's car remained in the garage, but a second vehicle registered to the family trust was missing.
The search began in the east wing, a section Eleanor had kept locked since Sebastian's father died. She claimed the roof was unsafe. It was not.
Behind the first locked door stood a private office filled with labeled binders. Each contained reports on Clara: meals, sleep, calls, arguments, doctor visits, even the number of times she cried. A second cabinet held copies of messages that appeared to come from Clara's phone but had never been sent by her.
One message read, I sometimes wish the baby would stop moving forever.
Another read, Sebastian would be better without me.
Quinn photographed everything.
Sebastian opened the final drawer and found a file bearing his own name.
Inside were reports dating back to his childhood. His school failures had been exaggerated. His friendships had been tracked. His father had written notes questioning Eleanor's behavior. On the last page was a legal memorandum about controlling the Vale family voting shares if Sebastian were ever judged emotionally compromised.
The scheme was larger than Clara.
At the end of the corridor, officers discovered a concealed elevator. It descended beneath the house.
The lower level held no wine cellar or storage room. It held a furnished suite with a crib, a locked medicine cabinet, soundproof walls, and no windows.
On the bed lay a packed hospital bag embroidered with the name Baby Vale.
Inside were newborn clothes, forged discharge papers, and two airline tickets.
One ticket bore Eleanor's name.
The other bore the name of a child who had not yet been born.
Destination: Montreux, Switzerland.
Departure: nine days from now.
Sebastian felt the floor shift beneath him.
Quinn opened the medicine cabinet. Most shelves were empty, wiped clean in haste. One bottle remained.
In the underground suite, Clara found a knitted blue cap she had made and lost a month earlier. Its presence proved Eleanor had been entering the couple's private rooms and collecting objects for the planned abduction. Sebastian held the cap in both hands, remembering how he had laughed when Clara accused someone of moving her things. The memory became another piece of evidence against him, not in court, but in the harder trial of whether he could become a husband who recognized harm before it became spectacle.
Its label had been removed.
May you like
On the glass, beneath a strip of tape, someone had written a single date.
Clara's due date.
