CHAP 2 — Death Does Not Breathe Like That
The room exploded.
Guests gasped. Someone dropped a glass. A woman near the lilies covered her mouth and began praying out loud.
Marcus lunged toward the coffin.
I slapped his hand away so hard his scotch spilled across the rug.
“Do not touch her.”
His smirk vanished.
“Daniel, you’re in shock.”
“No,” I said. “I’m awake.”
I pressed two fingers beneath Elena’s jaw.
Weak pulse.
Slow breathing.
Pupils sluggish but responsive when I lifted one eyelid.
Purple bruising on the neck.
Injection mark near the inner elbow.
High-dosage sedation.
Not death.
Not childbirth.
A crime scene wearing lilies.
My mother’s face tightened.
“You have been traveling for twenty hours. You are exhausted. The doctor already confirmed—”
“What doctor?”
She paused.
Too long.
That pause nearly killed her.
“What doctor?” I repeated.
Marcus tried to speak.
I turned on him.
“Name.”
He swallowed.
“Dr. Bellamy.”
Bellamy.
A private physician who had treated my mother for years and signed whatever wealthy families needed signed quietly.
I pulled out my phone and dialed 911.
My mother grabbed my sleeve again.
“Think very carefully before you drag this family through scandal.”
I looked at her hand on my suit.
Then at Elena’s bruises.
Then at Marcus’s pale face.
“You should have thought carefully before putting my pregnant wife in a coffin.”
Her eyes flashed.
For the first time, the performance cracked.
“There are things you don’t understand.”
“I understand pulse.”
I put the call on speaker.
“This is Daniel Cross at the Cross estate. I need an ambulance immediately. Pregnant female, nine months, alive, heavily sedated, staged as deceased. Possible assault. Possible attempted murder. Send police.”
A scream rose from the back of the room.
My mother went white.
Marcus backed toward the staircase.
I pointed at the security chief near the door.
“Lock the exits.”
He hesitated.
He had been hired by my mother while I was abroad.
Wrong hesitation.
I took one step closer.
“Now.”
He moved.
My mother hissed, “You have no authority to imprison guests.”
“No,” I said. “But I have authority over this house, this security contract, and every camera on this property.”
Marcus’s face changed again.
He had forgotten the cameras.
Or he thought my mother had disabled them.
She had disabled the app.
Not the cloud backup my team installed after a ransom threat two years earlier.
I looked at the coffin.
At Elena’s still face.
At our son moving beneath lace.
Then I called the second number.
Christian Hale.
Forensic auditor.
Former federal investigator.
The man I had secretly hired eight months earlier after noticing missing funds in the property empire I legally controlled.
Christian answered instantly.
“Daniel?”
I kept my eyes on my mother.
“Authorize the final audit.”
A small silence.
Then Christian said, “All entities?”
“All of them.”
May you like
My mother’s lips parted.
Marcus whispered, “What audit?”
