Chapter 3 - The Locked Nursery.
Ethan stared at the photograph until Mara stepped in front of it.
"Don't touch anything."
Her voice broke the spell.
Ethan nodded once.
Owen stood at the doorway with his face rigid.
"I had no idea this was here."
Mara did not look at him.
"That's why you're not touching anything either."
One of her investigators photographed the room from every angle.
The other scanned for active electronics.
The laptop was closed but plugged into a wall outlet through a newly installed power strip.
The video monitor was also powered.
A tiny green indicator light blinked beneath the screen.
Mara leaned closer.
"This isn't just storage."
Ethan already knew that.
The room had the stale smell of old plaster, but there was fresh coffee in a paper cup beside the laptop.
Someone had been there recently.
Perhaps during the gala.
Perhaps while Noah screamed downstairs.
"Can you open the computer?"
"Not here."
Mara pointed to the power connection.
"We document everything, isolate it, and image the drive."
Ethan glanced toward the monitor.
"What is that connected to?"
The technician examined the model number.
"Wireless receiver."
"For what?"
"Probably a camera."
Ethan's stomach tightened.
"Where?"
The technician turned the monitor on.
A grainy image appeared.
For half a second, Ethan did not understand what he was seeing.
Then he recognized the pale blue wallpaper.
Noah's nursery.
The camera angle came from somewhere above the wardrobe.
It showed the crib, rocking chair, changing table, and nearly the entire room.
Owen whispered something under his breath.
Ethan stepped closer.
"We already have a nursery camera."
"This isn't it," Owen said.
"I know."
Mara studied the feed.
"Who installed the authorized one?"
"Peter Cole."
"And who can access it?"
"Me, Anna, and the overnight nurse when she's scheduled."
"Claire?"
Ethan hesitated.
"She asked for access."
Mara looked at him.
"Did you give it to her?"
"No."
"Why not?"
The question embarrassed him because the answer was so simple.
"Anna said Noah slept better when fewer people checked the feed."
Mara's expression did not change.
"Your maid made the security decision?"
"My son's caregiver made a childcare recommendation."
"And Claire disliked it."
Ethan looked at the hidden monitor.
"Very much."
Mara nodded toward the laptop.
"Then this may have been her answer."
A sound came from the corridor.
Everyone turned.
Margaret stood at the far end with Anna beside her.
Anna still held Noah.
Ethan's immediate reaction was anger.
"I told you to stay downstairs."
Margaret ignored his tone.
"We heard glass break in the library."
Mara moved quickly toward them.
"What happened?"
Anna spoke first.
"A window cracked."
Owen's hand went to his radio.
"Which window?"
"The east one."
"Did you see anyone?"
Anna shook her head.
"No."
Margaret's expression was grim.
"But there was a stone on the carpet."
Mara looked at Ethan.
"Someone may be trying to distract us."
Owen spoke into his radio and ordered the property perimeter sealed.
Ethan walked toward Anna.
"Are you sure you're all right?"
"Yes."
"Noah?"
"He's fine."
The baby stared over Anna's shoulder toward the hidden room.
His expression shifted.
His lower lip trembled.
Then he began to cry.
Anna immediately turned him away from the doorway.
"It's okay."
Ethan watched the reaction.
"Has he been in this corridor before?"
Anna looked at him sharply.
"Not with me."
Mara heard the answer.
"What does that mean?"
Anna hesitated.
"Two weeks ago I found dust on the back of his sleeper after Claire watched him for an hour."
Ethan's head snapped toward her.
"You didn't tell me that."
"I thought he'd rolled under the reading-room bench."
"He can't crawl."
"I know."
Anna's voice grew smaller.
"That's why I started paying attention."
Mara looked back toward the secret room.
"Can Claire carry the baby through the service passage without appearing on the main hallway cameras?"
Owen answered.
"Yes."
Ethan's hands curled at his sides.
"Why would she bring him in there?"
No one answered.
Mara returned to the folding table.
She pointed to the photograph.
"We may know when we examine the computer."
The outside team packed the laptop and monitor into evidence bags.
They photographed the fresh coffee cup and a pale lipstick mark near the rim.
Anna saw the mark before Ethan did.
Her face changed.
"That's Claire's color."
Margaret looked at her.
"You're certain?"
"She asked me to find that shade for her last month when her regular brand sold out."
Ethan looked toward Mara.
"Can you test it?"
"We can preserve it."
Mara's tone remained measured.
"But don't decide the answer before the evidence does."
Ethan nodded.
He knew she was right.
He also knew he had never wanted to be wrong more badly in his life.
By one in the morning, the mansion had been divided into zones.
No employee was allowed into the west wing without an escort.
Security credentials were frozen.
Peter Cole and Daniel Ross had both been contacted and ordered not to access company systems.
Peter answered immediately from his home in Naperville.
Daniel did not answer at all.
At one fifteen, Owen received an automated alert.
Daniel's company phone had been turned off.
At one twenty-eight, his access badge was found in a trash can at a gas station ten miles north of the estate.
Mara did not call it evidence of guilt.
She called it evidence that Daniel did not want to be found.
Ethan sat in the nursery with Anna while Noah finally slept.
The room looked different now.
Every vent seemed suspicious.
Every decorative molding seemed capable of hiding a lens.
Mara's team had found the hidden camera above the wardrobe less than twenty minutes earlier.
It had been disguised inside a small smoke sensor installed three months ago.
Peter Cole's maintenance signature appeared on the work order.
Ethan remembered signing the renovation budget without reading every line.
That realization felt like a personal indictment.
Anna sat in the rocking chair.
"You couldn't have known."
Ethan looked at her.
"I should have."
"How?"
"This is my house."
"That doesn't make you able to see through walls."
"I'm his father."
Anna's eyes softened.
"Then be his father now."
The sentence stopped him.
No judgment.
No flattery.
Just instruction.
Ethan looked into the crib.
Noah slept with both hands near his face.
For the first time that night, Ethan noticed the child's breathing instead of the threat around him.
"What else haven't you told me?"
Anna looked down.
"I kept notes."
"Notes about Claire?"
"About Noah."
"Where?"
"My room."
"Bring them."
Anna hesitated.
"There is something in them you won't like."
"Tonight has lowered that bar considerably."
She almost smiled.
Then her face became serious again.
"Three times, Noah slept for almost five hours in the middle of the day after Claire spent time alone with him."
Ethan felt cold.
"He never does that."
"I know."
"Did you call the pediatrician?"
"I asked Claire if she'd given him anything."
"What did she say?"
"She said I was becoming obsessive."
Ethan stood.
"We're calling Dr. Levin now."
Anna nodded.
Before either of them moved, Ethan's phone vibrated.
The number belonged to Graham Pierce, the Vale family's outside attorney.
Ethan answered.
"Graham."
The lawyer did not greet him.
"Do not speak to the police."
Ethan's eyes narrowed.
"I haven't called the police."
There was a pause on the other end.
A very small pause.
May you like
But after the evening he had just survived, Ethan noticed pauses differently.
"Then keep it that way," Graham said.
