Chapter 3 - SOMEONE HAD BEEN INSIDE MY SON'S ROOM
I did not scream.
That remains the strangest thing I remember about seeing the photograph.
My eight-year-old son was asleep twenty feet down the hallway, and someone had sent me a picture taken from inside his bedroom.
Yet I made no sound.
Terror doesn't always arrive like panic.
Sometimes it makes you efficient.
I locked my phone.
Turned my head.
Dominic slept beside me.
Or appeared to.
His breathing was deep and even.
I watched him for three seconds before sliding from the bed.
The hallway was dark.
Noah's door stood partly open.
I crossed the distance barefoot.
The night-light beside his bookshelf cast soft blue stars against the ceiling.
Noah was exactly where he belonged.
Under his baseball comforter.
One arm outside the blanket.
Brown hair across his forehead.
The position matched the photograph.
My skin went cold.
I checked the windows.
Locked.
Closet.
Empty.
Bathroom.
Empty.
Then I noticed the chair beside his dresser.
Moved three feet from where it normally sat.
My hand trembled as I reached beneath Noah's pillow.
A habit Dominic had taught me years earlier.
Emergency button.
Small.
Black.
Connected directly to the household security office.
I pressed it once.
Thirty seconds later Marco appeared in the hall with two security men.
He saw my face and stopped.
“What?”
I showed him the message.
His entire expression changed.
“Mr. Caruso?”
“Sleeping.”
“Wake him.”
“No.”
Marco stared at me.
“Mrs. Caruso—”
“Check the house first.”
He hesitated.
I had spent years being treated by Dominic's men as the elegant civilian wife who attended charity dinners and kept Noah away from unpleasant conversations.
They occasionally forgot I had been beside Dominic before many of them.
“Check every camera,” I said. “Every door log. Nobody tells Dominic until I know whether this came from inside his security team.”
That got Marco's attention.
He nodded once.
“Stay with the boy.”
I did.
Noah never woke.
I sat beside him while men moved quietly through the house.
Twenty-five minutes later Marco returned.
“No forced entry.”
“That isn't comforting.”
“No.”
“Camera footage?”
“Reviewing.”
“Who entered the second floor tonight?”
“Household staff left by seven. Two officers rotated upstairs at ten.”
“Names.”
“Alvarez and Keating.”
“Where are they?”
“Both downstairs.”
The photo burned against my palm through the phone.
“Can someone access our cameras remotely?”
“Not without credentials.”
“That isn't what I asked.”
Marco's jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
“Who has credentials?”
“Mr. Caruso. Me. Rafael. Security administrator.”
Rafael.
The man behind Dominic at the stadium.
My heartbeat changed.
“Wake Dominic.”
This time Marco didn't argue.
Dominic was fully alert before he reached Noah's doorway.
He looked at the photograph once.
Then again.
I watched something primitive enter his face.
Not jealousy.
Not guilt.
Rage.
“Where did this come from?”
“Unknown number.”
“When?”
“Thirty minutes ago.”
“Why didn't you wake me immediately?”
“Because I didn't know whether the person who sent it worked for you.”
His head snapped toward me.
Marco looked away.
Dominic stared.
“What the hell does that mean?”
I opened Noah's tablet.
The clip appeared.
Dominic went still.
I pressed play.
The stadium.
The crowd.
Sloan's hand.
The kiss.
Dominic watched himself betray me.
The screen returned to the game.
Nobody spoke.
I replayed it and paused on Sloan's wrist.
Then Rafael.
Dominic's eyes moved between them.
“You told me you had a meeting,” I said quietly.
“Elena—”
“You told me Rafael was with you for part of it.”
“He was.”
“At the stadium?”
“This is not what it looks like.”
I laughed once.
There may be no sentence in human history more guilty than that one.
“Which part? Your mouth on hers? The restricted security band? Rafael standing behind you while someone photographs our sleeping child?”
Dominic looked at the wristband.
His face changed.
And there it was.
Recognition.
Not confusion.
Recognition.
“You know what that is.”
He didn't answer.
“Dominic.”
“Marco, take Noah downstairs.”
“No.”
Dominic looked at me.
“Noah stays where I can see him.”
“He'll be safer in the interior room.”
“And I'll be beside him.”
Dominic lowered his voice.
“Elena, please.”
I hated how much one word still affected me.
Please.
Rare from him.
“I want the truth.”
“You're going to get it.”
“No. I'm getting it now.”
His eyes moved toward Noah.
Our son slept through the destruction of his parents.
Dominic finally looked back at me.
“Sloan has been working with me privately for six weeks.”
“I know what kind of work I saw.”
His jaw tightened.
“There are problems at Terminal Nine.”
“Federal inspection.”
He stared.
“You called someone.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“Not your concern.”
“Elena.”
“Welcome to marriage.”
Pain flashed behind his eyes.
Good.
“There are missing shipping records,” he said. “Financial discrepancies. Someone has been routing unauthorized activity through the terminal.”
“Someone inside Caruso Atlantic.”
“Yes.”
“Rafael?”
“I don't know.”
“You're lying again.”
“I suspected him.”
“Then why was he sitting behind you?”
“Because I wanted him there.”
That stopped me.
Dominic stepped closer.
“Sloan arranged a meeting with someone we believe has been buying information from our company. The stadium suite was neutral territory.”
“Your romantic performance part of the agenda?”
His face hardened.
“No.”
“Did she surprise you?”
Silence.
That silence told me more than his answer could have.
“How long?”
“Elena.”
“How long have you been sleeping with her?”
“I'm not sleeping with her.”
“But you've kissed her before.”
His eyes closed for less than a second.
There are silences you can survive.
That one killed something.
I nodded slowly.
“Thank you.”
“Elena, listen to me.”
“No.”
“I made a mistake.”
“A mistake is missing an exit.”
“I know.”
“No, you don't.”
My voice stayed quiet because Noah was sleeping.
That somehow made everything worse.
“You came home tonight, stood in our kitchen, looked me in the face, and lied. You kissed my forehead with her mouth still in your evening.”
His expression broke.
“Elena.”
“Don't.”
He stopped.
I pointed toward Sloan's wristband.
“Explain that.”
“I can't yet.”
“Then get out.”
“This is my house.”
“And that is your son. Someone photographed him while he slept because of something you are involved in.”
That landed.
Dominic looked toward Noah.
His voice lowered.
“I will find whoever did it.”
“And until you do, you don't get to tell me what I need to know.”
Marco returned.
“Sir.”
Something in his voice made Dominic turn.
“We found a camera.”
Every part of me froze.
“Where?”
“Inside the smoke detector outside Noah's room.”
Dominic's face emptied.
Marco held up a clear evidence pouch.
Inside was a tiny black device.
Wireless.
Recently installed.
“Any prints?”
“No idea yet.”
Dominic looked at me.
Then the device.
“Lock the property down.”
Marco nodded.
“No vehicles in or out. Nobody leaves.”
“And Rafael?”
Marco hesitated.
“He isn't answering.”
Dominic pulled out his phone.
I looked again at the frozen television image.
Sloan.
Dominic.
Rafael.
The wristband.
Then Mia sent me a message.
I opened it.
FOUND SOMETHING.
CALL ME WHEN YOU'RE ALONE.
I stepped into Noah's bathroom and locked the door.
Mia answered immediately.
“I checked an old compliance contact.”
“What?”
“A red-and-silver band was issued tonight under temporary legal access.”
“To Sloan?”
“No.”
My throat tightened.
“To whom?”
Mia went silent.
“Elena, it was issued under your name.”
For a moment I could hear only my own pulse.
“I wasn't at Terminal Nine.”
“I know.”
“It has to be a clerical error.”
“It gets worse.”
“How?”
“The credential was scanned into the restricted records wing at 8:41 p.m.”
I looked through the bathroom doorway toward my sleeping child.
At 8:41, I had been washing dishes while Noah watched baseball.
“Can you get camera footage?”
“I already asked.”
“And?”
Mia swallowed.
“There's an image.”
“What image?”
“A woman entered the records room wearing a dark coat and sunglasses.”
I waited.
Mia spoke carefully.
“She used your credentials.”
“That doesn't make her me.”
“No.”
“Then why do you sound like that?”
“Because, Elena…”
May you like
Her next sentence turned my blood to ice.
“She looks exactly like you.”
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