Chapter 2 - Richard
I make it exactly three steps down the hallway before I have to stop and brace myself against the wall.
My hands are shaking.
Richard Kane, who's negotiated billion-dollar deals without breaking a sweat, who's stared down corporate raiders and hostile takeovers with perfect composure, who built an empire on the foundation of never showing weakness, is shaking like a teenager after his first kiss.
Except this is nothing like that innocent rush of adolescent hormones. This is darker, more complicated, wrapped in layers of guilt and protective rage that threatens to choke me.
She's here. Belle is here, in my house, wearing that goddamn wedding dress that was supposed to seal her fate to my son.
Ex-son, I correct mentally. Nathan stopped being my son the moment I saw the fingerprint bruises on Belle's arm eighteen months ago and he looked me in the eye and lied about them.
I push off the wall and force myself to keep walking, down the stairs, through the main living area with its floor-to-ceiling windows that currently show nothing but my own reflection against the darkening forest beyond.
I look haunted. Drawn. Like a man who's been living in self-imposed exile and just had the one thing he was hiding from delivered directly to his doorstep.
The one person, I amend.
God, even my thoughts are dangerous where she's concerned.
My office is on the first floor, tucked into the corner of the house with views of the forest on two sides. I close the door behind me: solid wood, soundproofed, one of the few rooms in this glass fortress where I can truly be alone, and pull out my phone.
Marcus answers on the second ring. "Sir?"
"The woman who just arrived," I say, keeping my voice level and professional. "I need a full security brief. Who saw her come in, what condition she was in, whether she was followed. Everything."
"Already compiled." Because of course it is.
Marcus has been my head of security for five years, and the man is nothing if not efficient.
"I'll send it to your encrypted email in the next ten minutes.
But the short version is that she arrived alone, on foot, no vehicle in pursuit or waiting nearby.
Appeared distressed but uninjured. No weapons, no surveillance devices.
The nearest bus stop is two miles from your main gate, so she likely walked from there. "
Two miles. In a wedding dress and heels. The image makes something twist in my chest.
"Local police activity?"
"Nothing unusual. Sheriff’s department has been quiet all day. No APBs, no missing person reports that match her description."
Which means Nathan hasn't gone public yet. He's looking for her privately, through his own channels. Probably trying to avoid the embarrassment of admitting his bride ran away at the altar.
Good. That buys us time.
"Increase perimeter security," I tell Marcus. "I want someone on each checkpoint twenty-four-seven, not just during shift changes. Install additional cameras on the access road. And I want to know the moment anyone comes within a mile of this property who isn't on the approved list."
"Expecting trouble, sir?"
I think about Nathan's cold eyes, his entitled rage, the way he treats people like possessions to be owned and controlled. My son inherited his mother's narcissism and combined it with my intelligence and ruthlessness, creating something I barely recognize as human.
"Yes," I say quietly. "I'm expecting trouble."
"Understood. I'll implement the changes immediately."
I end the call and move to the bar cart in the corner. Waterford crystal decanters filled with liquor that costs more than most people's monthly rent. I pour two fingers of eighteen-year-old scotch and down it in one swallow, relishing the burn.
It doesn't help.
Nothing helps when I close my eyes and see Belle standing in my doorway, mascara-streaked, terrified and still so goddamn beautiful.
She shouldn't be beautiful to me. She shouldn't be anything to me except the woman my son was abusing, the victim I failed to protect. Should inspire only professional concern, detached assistance, the kind of help I'd offer any woman in her situation.
But Belle Hart has never been just any woman, and I stopped pretending otherwise about six months after I met her.
I remember that first dinner with painful clarity. Nathan bringing her to what was supposed to be a family meal, the four of us sitting around Victoria's formal dining table like we were still a functional unit instead of the wreckage of something that died fifteen years ago.
Belle had been quieter then, newer to Nathan's control. She'd smiled and made polite conversation, asked thoughtful questions about my work, laughed at appropriate moments. Perfectly pleasant, perfectly forgettable.
Except I couldn't forget her.
The way her eyes lit up when she talked about the art history degree she'd abandoned to take a job with better insurance after her parents died.
The way she unconsciously touched her wrist when Nathan said something cutting disguised as a joke.
The way she looked at me when she thought no one was watching, like I was something rare and valuable instead of the villain in her boyfriend's childhood story.
I'd gone home that night and told myself it was nothing. A fleeting attraction to a pretty girl, the kind of thing any man my age might feel and then dismiss as inappropriate.
Then I saw her again. And again. Each time, Nathan's treatment got worse. The cutting remarks became open insults. The controlling behavior became isolation. The bruises appeared.
And each time, my feelings for Belle grew more complicated, more intense, more absolutely fucking forbidden.
I pour another scotch and force myself to sit down at my desk, pulling up the security feed on my computer. I shouldn't check on her. It's invasive, creepy, exactly the kind of thing that confirms I have no business feeling what I feel.
I check anyway.
The guest room camera, positioned to cover only the doorway and sitting area, nothing private like the bedroom or bathroom, shows an empty room. She must be in the shower. Good. She needs it, needs the time to decompress, to start processing what she's done.
What she's done.
Christ, she actually ran. After two years of watching her sink deeper into Nathan's control, seeing the light fade from her eyes bit by bit, I'd almost given up hope that she'd find the strength to leave.
But she did. She ran, and she came here.
To me.
The guilt is immediate and crushing. She came here because I'm the only person who offered to help her, the only one who acknowledged what Nathan was doing. She came here out of desperation and lack of options, not because of any feelings she might—
I cut off that thought before it can fully form. Belle's feelings are irrelevant. Even if she did feel something, which she doesn't, she can't, I'm twice her age and her ex-almost-father-in-law and completely wrong for her in every possible way, it wouldn't matter.
She's vulnerable right now. Traumatized. Looking for safety and stability and someone to tell her she did the right thing. Taking advantage of that vulnerability would make me exactly the kind of monster Nathan already thinks I am.
My phone buzzes. Marcus's security brief, detailed and thorough as expected. I skim through it, noting the timestamps, the observation notes, the complete lack of anything suspicious beyond Belle herself.
Then I see the final note: *Subject appeared emotionally distressed.
Asked for you by name. Security protocol suggested redirect to main office, but subject insisted she needed to speak with you specifically.
Judgment call was made to contact you directly.
Recommend follow-up psychological evaluation if subject is to remain on property. *
I stare at that last line, jaw tightening. Marcus is doing his job—treating Belle like a potential security risk, someone who might be unstable or dangerous. It's the correct professional response.
It also makes me want to walk out to the guard station and explain in very clear terms that Belle Hart is under my personal protection and anyone who treats her like a threat will be looking for a new job.
I don't, because that would reveal far too much about my state of mind where she's concerned.
Instead, I type out a brief response: *Subject is a personal acquaintance in need of temporary sanctuary. Increase security to protect her, not monitor her. She has full access to main house and grounds. Report any attempts by outside parties to locate or contact her immediately.*
Send.
The intercom on my desk buzzes. My housekeeper letting me know Belle's dinner is ready. I tell her to take it up in twenty minutes, giving Belle enough time to finish her shower and find something to wear from the guest room closet.
The closet that I had stocked six months ago with clothes in Belle's size, just in case. Just in case she ran, just in case she came here, just in case I needed to be prepared to help her.
I'd told myself it was practical. Good planning. The kind of contingency preparation that made me successful in business.
I'd been lying to myself.
I stocked that closet because some part of me wanted Belle here, in my house, wearing clothes I'd selected. Wanted to erase every trace of Nathan from her life and replace it with something better.
With me.
The thought sits in my mind like poison, and I don't push it away fast enough.
My phone rings again. Victoria's number flashing on the screen.
I stare at it for three rings before declining the call.
She'll leave a voicemail, undoubtedly something venomous about how I've probably ruined Nathan's wedding day, how Belle was clearly lying about the abuse, how I'm trying to destroy our son's happiness out of jealousy.
She's called me three times since I moved to Blackwater Falls. I've answered once, told her not to contact me again, and blocked her number.
She calls from different numbers now. I decline them all.