Chapter 3 - What Amelia Stole From the Safe
Dr. Evelyn Bell arrived twenty minutes later.
Amelia refused to let her through the door.
“I said no.”
She stood barefoot in Adrian’s guest suite wearing an oversized black robe that one of the housekeepers had brought after carefully helping her out of the ruined wedding gown.
Adrian waited in the hallway.
Evelyn was in her sixties, composed and unimpressed by powerful men. She had treated Adrian’s family since he was nineteen.
“She doesn’t want an examination,” Adrian said.
Evelyn raised an eyebrow.
“Then why am I here?”
“Because she’s pregnant.”
“That still doesn’t make her your patient.”
“She fell.”
“And she is conscious enough to say no.”
Adrian looked through the open doorway.
Amelia sat on the edge of the bed.
Evelyn lowered her voice.
“You brought a terrified woman here against her will. The first thing you can give back to her is the ability to decide what happens to her body.”
The words landed harder than Adrian expected.
He nodded.
“You’re right.”
He stepped away from the door.
“Tell her you’re available if she changes her mind.”
Evelyn entered alone.
Adrian walked downstairs.
Marco was waiting in the study.
“We traced the message.”
“And?”
“Sebastian accessed Amelia’s phone records through a private security contractor.”
“How?”
“He paid someone.”
“Name?”
“Still working on it.”
Adrian poured coffee instead of whiskey.
“Where is Croft now?”
“Manhattan. He left the wedding about an hour after the kidnapping.”
“Did Arthur report Amelia missing?”
Marco hesitated.
“No.”
Adrian looked up.
“Penelope?”
“No.”
“Police?”
“Nothing.”
Adrian laughed without amusement.
“They believe one of their daughters was abducted from the Plaza Hotel and they haven’t contacted the police?”
“They know it wasn’t Penelope.”
“So Amelia doesn’t matter.”
Marco leaned against the desk.
“Apparently not enough.”
Adrian’s expression darkened.
“What about Croft?”
“He’s looking.”
“For her?”
“Aggressively.”
That told Adrian everything.
Arthur Harrington had already written Amelia off.
Sebastian had not.
“Find out why.”
Two hours later, Amelia finally agreed to let Evelyn examine her.
Adrian did not attend.
He remained downstairs until Evelyn appeared.
“Well?”
“Mother appears stable. So does the pregnancy.”
Something in Adrian’s chest loosened.
“Anything else?”
Evelyn studied him.
“Yes.”
He waited.
“She has multiple healed injuries.”
His jaw tightened.
“Recent?”
“Some.”
“From Croft?”
“She didn’t say.”
“But you know.”
“I know enough to tell you not to interrogate her.”
Adrian frowned.
“I’m not interrogating her.”
Evelyn gave him a long look.
“What do you call what you normally do?”
“Conversation.”
Evelyn almost smiled.
“This woman has spent years learning to survive someone who controls her. If you want her to trust you, don’t become another man who demands answers.”
Adrian hated advice.
He hated it more when it was correct.
“Can she travel?”
“Physically? Probably. Emotionally? That’s not my decision.”
Adrian looked toward the staircase.
“Sebastian is searching for her.”
“Then perhaps you should ask Amelia what she wants.”
Not tell her.
Ask her.
That night, Adrian found Amelia in the library.
She had changed into simple clothes brought by the housekeeper. Her damp blond hair rested against her shoulders.
She was staring at the fire.
“Doctor says you’re all right.”
Amelia turned.
“She told you?”
“She told me only what you allowed.”
That surprised her.
Adrian sat across from her.
“Sebastian is searching for you.”
She looked down.
“I know.”
“He has private investigators checking airports, train stations and bus terminals.”
“He’ll find me eventually.”
“Not here.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true.”
Amelia’s fingers tightened around a mug of tea.
“You think because people fear you, he will too.”
“They do.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
Adrian leaned back.
“Explain.”
Amelia looked at him.
“Sebastian doesn’t think rules apply to him.”
“Neither do I.”
“Exactly.”
For the first time, Adrian almost smiled.
“Maybe that makes me qualified.”
“It makes you dangerous.”
“Yes.”
The simple admission unsettled her.
Adrian did not pretend to be good.
He did not disguise power beneath manners.
Strangely, that made him easier to read than Sebastian.
“Why did you stay with him?” Adrian asked.
Amelia’s face closed.
He remembered Evelyn’s warning.
“Forget I asked.”
Amelia looked at him with surprise.
Adrian changed the question.
“What do you need tonight?”
She stared at the fire.
“A locked door.”
“You have one.”
“A phone he can’t trace.”
“You’ll have one.”
“My passport.”
“Where is it?”
“Sebastian keeps it.”
Adrian’s expression changed.
“In his penthouse?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
“My mother’s necklace.”
“What kind?”
“A small silver locket.”
“Where?”
“Same place.”
“Then we’ll retrieve both.”
Amelia shook her head.
“No.”
“You just said you need your passport.”
“I didn’t say you should break into his apartment.”
“I didn’t say I would.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Something more irritating.”
The following afternoon, Sebastian Croft arrived at the estate gates.
Amelia saw his car through an upstairs window.
Her body went rigid.
“No.”
The word came automatically.
Adrian was standing behind her.
“He can’t enter.”
“You don’t know that.”
“My property. My gate. My men.”
“He always gets inside.”
“Not today.”
Amelia moved away from the window.
“You shouldn’t have let him know I’m here.”
“I didn’t.”
“Then how did he—”
“Someone talked.”
Adrian’s expression hardened.
“And I intend to discover who.”
A guard entered.
“Mr. Croft is demanding to see Ms. Hastings.”
“What did you tell him?” Adrian asked.
“That there is no Ms. Hastings registered on the property.”
“Good.”
“He says he has proof.”
Amelia’s face drained of color.
Sebastian’s voice suddenly came through the security intercom.
“Amelia.”
She flinched.
“I know you can hear me.”
Adrian looked at the panel.
Sebastian continued.
“You’ve made a terrible mistake.”
Amelia’s hands began shaking.
“I’m not angry.”
That frightened her more.
“I only want you home.”
Adrian watched her.
Sebastian’s tone was soft.
Loving, almost.
The same voice he used after every violent night.
“I know you’re frightened. Those men took you. You’re confused.”
Amelia whispered, “Turn it off.”
Adrian reached for the switch.
Then Sebastian said something that stopped him.
“And we need to discuss our child.”
Amelia became completely still.
Adrian looked at her.
“You said he didn’t know.”
“He didn’t.”
Sebastian continued through the speaker.
“Ten weeks, Amelia. You should have told me.”
She staggered backward.
“How?”
Adrian’s expression turned dangerous.
The medical examination.
Someone had leaked it.
Dr. Bell was trustworthy.
The estate staff had been carefully vetted.
Which meant someone inside Adrian’s security network was working for Croft.
Adrian pressed the intercom.
“Croft.”
Silence.
Then Sebastian answered.
“Rossi.”
“If you mention Amelia’s child again, you and I are going to develop a very personal problem.”
Sebastian laughed.
“That child is mine.”
“No child belongs to someone.”
“She belongs with me.”
Adrian looked at Amelia.
“No,” he said.
Amelia stared at him.
Sebastian’s voice became colder.
“You kidnapped my fiancée.”
Adrian smiled faintly.
“Interesting. I thought she was your girlfriend.”
Amelia closed her eyes.
Sebastian had never proposed.
Not privately.
Not publicly.
The lie was about ownership.
Adrian continued.
“She is an adult. She can leave whenever she chooses.”
“Then send her outside.”
Adrian turned to Amelia.
“Do you want to go?”
For three terrible seconds she could not speak.
Sebastian waited.
Adrian waited.
The guards waited.
Amelia finally stepped toward the intercom.
Her knees were trembling.
But her voice was clear.
“No.”
A long silence followed.
Sebastian spoke softly.
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do.”
“You’re emotional.”
“I’m leaving you.”
“You’re carrying my baby.”
“That doesn’t mean you own me.”
Adrian watched something change inside her.
It was small.
Fragile.
But real.
Sebastian abandoned the gentle voice.
“You ungrateful little—”
Adrian disconnected the intercom.
Amelia stared at the dark speaker.
Outside, Sebastian began pounding against the gate.
Adrian turned to Marco.
“Remove him.”
Marco nodded.
“And find the leak.”
Within minutes, Sebastian’s vehicle disappeared down the private road.
Amelia remained beside the window.
Her entire body was shaking.
“I told him no.”
Adrian stood a few feet away.
“Yes.”
“I’ve never done that before.”
“I know.”
She pressed a hand against her mouth.
Then the tears came.
Not frightened tears.
Something deeper.
Years of humiliation, fear and silence breaking open all at once.
Adrian did not touch her.
He simply stayed.
After several minutes, Amelia whispered, “Why are you helping me?”
Adrian looked toward the rain outside.
“At first?”
He did not lie.
“I needed to know whether Arthur Harrington would exchange something valuable for you.”
Amelia gave a bitter laugh.
“And now?”
Adrian turned toward her.
“Now I want to know why Sebastian Croft is terrified of you getting away.”
Amelia’s expression changed.
Adrian noticed.
“There is something you haven’t told me.”
She looked toward the door.
Then back at him.
“Yes.”
“What?”
Amelia swallowed.
“When I was packing to leave Sebastian, I found documents in his private safe.”
Adrian became motionless.
“What documents?”
“Accounts. Payments. Properties.”
“To whom?”
“I don’t know all of them.”
She lowered her voice.
“But one name appeared over and over.”
“Whose?”
Amelia looked directly into his eyes.
“Arthur Harrington.”
The territorial war between Rossi and Harrington suddenly looked very different.
Adrian had spent a year believing Arthur was his enemy.
Now it appeared Sebastian Croft might have been financing the conflict from both sides.
May you like
And Amelia—the woman no one valued enough to protect—might have accidentally discovered enough information to destroy them all.
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