Chapter 15
No.1
The soft, melodic sound of French filled the hallway of the Long Island safe house.
Elisa pushed open the door to the guest bedroom.
Kayden was sitting cross-legged on the thick white rug. She was five years old, with dark hair and striking, intelligent eyes. She held a massive,hardcover book on astrophysics in her lap, reading the complex French text aloud without stumbling.
Kayden looked up. Her eyes instantly locked onto the thick white bandage wrapped around Elisa's right arm.
Kayden carefully closed the book. She stood up and walked over, deliberately keeping her hands away from Elisa's right side. She wrapped her small arms tightly around Elisa's left leg, burying her face in her thigh.
"You're hurt, Maman," Kayden whispered.
Elisa dropped to her knees. She wrapped her left arm around her daughter, pulling her small, warm body against her chest. The smell of baby shampoo and warm milk filled her senses.
No.2
The violent rage that had been boiling in Elisa's blood all night instantly evaporated. This was her anchor. This was the only thing in the world that mattered.
"I'm okay, baby," Elisa kissed the top of Kayden's head. "It's just a scratch."
After breakfast, Elisa sat in the sunroom. The morning light poured over the glass table.
She opened her encrypted laptop.
Before she could open her secure email client, a notification popped up in the corner of the screen.
It was from an anonymous Instagram account she had created years ago to monitor August's inner circle. Devon had just posted a new photo.
Elisa clicked the notification.
No.3
The screen loaded a high-definition photo. The location tag read: Aspen, Colorado.
In the center of the frame, surrounded by three feet of pristine white snow, sat a massive Gulfstream G650 private jet. The Chambers family crest was painted on the tail.①
August was walking down the metal stairs of the jet. He was wearing a custom Moncler skisuit.In his arms, he carried Allena, who was bundled in white mink, wearing oversized designer sunglasses.
Devon's caption below the photo read: When the lady gets a little pollen allergy in NY, the boss flies her to the snow. True love wins.
Elisa stared at the words. Pollen allergy.
Her lungs tightened. The air left the room.
She looked down at her right arm. The deep,jagged wound throbbed with a dull, sickening ache.
No.4
She had been shoved into a glass table, her flesh sliced open, bleeding onto a rug. August had looked at her with disgust and told her to apologize.
Allena sneezed, and he mobilized a sixty-million-dollar aircraft to fly her across the country.
The sheer, staggering magnitude of the double standard didn't break Elisa's heart. It didn't make her cry.
It acted like a chemical burn, cauterizing the last bleeding nerve of her marriage.2
Elisa's face went completely blank. She felt nothing. Absolute, terrifying zero.
She moved her mouse, clicked on Devon's profile,and hit 'Unfollow'. Then, she went to the account settings and permanently deleted the anonymous Instagram profile.
She was done looking at the past.
No.5
Elisa opened a command-line terminal.Her fingers flew across the keyboard, typing lines of complex code.
She bypassed three firewalls and accessed a hidden,dark-web email server.
She typed a single email address: A.Cromwell@Aethel.net.
The subject line was blank.
The body of the email contained one sentence: I'm ready to wake Chiron up.
She hit send.
Elisa didn't even have time to close the window before her screen flashed. A reply arrived in less than ten seconds.
No.6
Alastair: God, it's about time, Faye. I'm in New York.
The Core Club. Tonight at 8.
Elisa closed the laptop.
She stood up and walked into the bedroom. She opened the closet Jewel had stocked for her.
She pushed past the soft sweaters and pastel dresses. She reached into the back and pulled out a sharp, tailored, pitch-black Tom Ford women's suit.
She laid it on the bed. She walked into the bathroom and picked up a tube of dark, blood-red lipstick.
She applied it perfectly. She looked at her reflection. The jagged, chopped hair framed her sharp jawline. The red lips looked like a warning.
No.7
The quiet, submissive nurse who let a mandictate her worth was dead.
Faye was awake.