Chapter 2 - The Sound of the Iron Gate
Footsteps scraped across the hardwood floor of the cottage entryway, and Margaret’s voice cut through the heavy, stagnant air.
“Claire? What are you doing in here?”
Her tone wasn’t panicked anymore. It was completely flat, devoid of the warm grandmotherly affection she had worn all morning.
Before I could turn around, the woman chained to the bed let out a sharp, terrified whimper and pulled her bruised ankle backward, desperately trying to hide behind the rusted metal frame.
“You lied,” I said, my voice shaking as I spun around to face Margaret. “There are no construction workers. There’s a person locked in here!”
Margaret stood in the doorway, blocking the only exit. Her cream-colored linen blazer was immaculate, and her silver hair was still perfectly styled, but her eyes had narrowed into cold, calculating slits.
“You shouldn’t have come back, Claire,” Margaret said quietly, taking a slow step forward. “You had your purse. You should have stayed in the rideshare.”
“Who is she? Margaret, what is this? I’m calling the police right now!” I fumbled in my bag for my phone, my fingers trembling so badly I could barely grip the screen.
“If you call the police,” Margaret said, her voice dropping into a chillingly calm register, “your father’s company, your family’s savings, and everything your parents spent their entire lives building will be tied up in federal litigation before sunset. Ethan holds the commercial debt on all three of your family’s hardware stores. Did you really think he didn’t protect his investments?”
My thumb froze over the screen.
For fourteen months, Ethan had offered to help my father restructure his commercial mortgages to save on taxes. Dad had signed the papers without reading every single fine-print clause, trusting his future son-in-law implicitly.
“Ethan owns them?” I whispered.
“Ethan owns everything,” Margaret smiled, a thin, cruel expression that didn’t reach her eyes. “And you were going to sign a post-nuptial asset-sharing agreement tomorrow morning after the ceremony, weren’t you? Such a compliant girl. Until you let your curiosity get the better of you.”
Behind Margaret, the woman in the torn nightgown raised her head.
“Don't marry him,” the woman choked out, her voice raspy from dehydration. “I’m his wife. Sarah. My name is Sarah Miller. We got married two years ago in Seattle. I tried to leave when I found out what he did to the others... and this is what he did to me.”
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Margaret shot a furious glance back into the room, then lunged forward to grab my wrist, but I twisted away, bolted past her through the doorway, and sprinted down the hallway.
“Ethan!” Margaret screamed behind me, her voice echoing through the mansion. “Stop her!”
