CHAPTER 22
AUDREY
I shouldn't have let go of his hand.
The moment Malcolm walked through the heavy oak doors of the library, the temperature in the ballroom seemed to drop ten degrees. I stood near the bar, holding my glass of bourbon, keeping my spine perfectly straight and my expression completely bored as Simon approached me.
I handled Simon. I watched him retreat, his ego fractured, completely terrified of the threat Malcolm had whispered to him on the street two weeks ago. I won that interaction.
But then the music changed.
The chamber orchestra transitioned from a slow, classical piece into something louder, more chaotic. The crowd shifted, moving toward the center of the room as the waitstaff began clearing the floor for dancing.
In the movement, I lost sight of the east exit. I lost sight of Grant.
Someone bumped into my shoulder—a woman in a heavy sequined dress who didn't bother to apologize. I stumbled slightly, my stiletto catching on the edge of the thick Persian rug. I reached out to steady myself against the edge of the bar, setting my glass down.
When I turned back around, the crowd had closed in completely.
"Excuse me," I said, trying to step around a group of board members discussing real estate.
They didn't move. They didn't even acknowledge I had spoken.
I took a step to the left, aiming for the corridor that led to the library. I needed to get back to the door. I needed to be standing exactly where Malcolm left me when he came out of that meeting.
A hand clamped down on my bare arm.
The grip was hard, bruising, entirely devoid of the careful, protective pressure Malcolm uses when he touches me.
I gasped, twisting my body to pull away.
A man in a plain black suit was standing right behind me. He wasn't a guest. He wasn't wearing a tuxedo. He had a small earpiece curled around his right ear, and his eyes were completely dead.
"Miss Jennings," the man said, his voice low enough that it didn't carry over the music. "Preston Vance requested that you join him in the conservatory."
"Preston Vance is in a board meeting in the library," I replied, my voice shaking slightly despite my best efforts to keep it steady. I tried to pull my arm free again, but his fingers dug into my bicep.
"The meeting concluded," the man lied smoothly. "Please come with me. We don't want to make a scene."
I looked around. There were at least fifty people within screaming distance. The mayor was standing twenty feet away. But no one was looking at me. The Vance family estate operates on a very specific set of rules: if security is handling someone, you look the other way. You don't get involved.
A second man in a black suit stepped up on my other side, boxing me in completely.
Preston has stationed four plainclothes contractors inside the ballroom.
Malcolm’s warning from the car echoed in my head. This wasn't a request. It was an extraction.
"Let go of me," I said, dropping my voice to a harsh whisper. "If Malcolm finds out you touched me—"
"Mr. Vance is currently occupied," the first man interrupted. He pulled me forward, forcing me to walk. "This way."
They didn't drag me. They walked close enough to my sides that to anyone watching, it looked like we were having a private, urgent conversation as we moved through the crowd. The gold silk of my dress brushed against their cheap suits.
My heart hammered a frantic, terrified rhythm against my ribs.
I tried to scan the room for Grant, but the sea of tuxedos and evening gowns blurred together. We reached the heavy double doors at the back of the ballroom, far away from the main entrance and the library.
The second man pushed the doors open.
They shoved me into the dark, narrow hallway. The music from the ballroom was instantly muffled as the doors clicked shut behind us.
The temperature in the corridor was freezing. There was no heating back here. It was a service hallway, designed for the catering staff to move between the kitchens and the event spaces without being seen by the guests.
"Where are you taking me?" I demanded, planting my feet on the linoleum floor.
The first man didn't answer. He just grabbed my arm again, his grip tighter this time, and pulled me down the hall.
We passed two closed doors before stopping in front of a third. The man opened it and pushed me inside.
I stumbled, my heel catching on the threshold. I threw my hands out, catching myself against the edge of a heavy wooden table before I could hit the floor.
The room was small, smelling faintly of bleach and old dust. It wasn't a conservatory. It was an old butler’s pantry, stripped of its furniture save for the table and a single folding chair. The only light came from a small, barred window near the ceiling.
I spun around just as the door shut.
The lock clicked into place.
I ran to the door, grabbing the brass handle. I pulled it. I twisted it. I threw my weight against the heavy wood.
It didn't budge.
"Hey!" I shouted, hitting the door with the flat of my hand. "Open the door!"
Silence.
I stepped back, my chest heaving. The cold air in the small room bit into the bare skin of my back. I wrapped my arms around my waist, shivering violently.
Think, Audrey. Think.
I looked around the room. There was no other exit. The window was too high and too small to climb through, even if I could break the glass. The table was bolted to the floor.
I reached into the small, hidden pocket of the gold dress. The designer had included it specifically for a lipstick or a key card.
My fingers brushed against empty silk.
My phone was in my clutch. My clutch was sitting on the bar in the main ballroom, exactly where I left it when the security contractor grabbed me.
I closed my eyes, a wave of absolute, crushing panic washing over me.
I was completely cut off. Malcolm was in the library, probably fighting for his career. Grant was at the east exit, looking for a woman who was no longer in the room. And I was locked in a closet in the back of a mansion owned by a man who wanted to destroy me.
He wants to see if we break.
Malcolm’s voice cut through the panic in my head.
I opened my eyes. I looked down at my left hand. The vintage diamond was still there, a heavy, permanent reminder of the man who put it on my finger.
I am not a liability.
I forced my breathing to slow down. I dropped my arms from my waist, standing up straight despite the freezing temperature in the room.
Preston didn't have me killed. If he wanted me dead, the contractors wouldn't have brought me to a pantry. They brought me here to isolate me. They brought me here to wait.
I walked over to the folding chair and sat down.
I didn't scream again. I didn't hit the door. I sat in the dark, my hands resting in my lap, and I waited.
It took twenty minutes.
The lock clicked.
I didn't stand up. I kept my posture perfectly rigid, my chin high, my expression completely blank.
The door opened.
Simon walked into the room.
He wasn't flanked by the security contractors. He was alone. He closed the door behind him, but he didn't lock it. He stood near the entrance, looking at me sitting in the folding chair in the middle of the dark room.
He looked exhausted. The polished, arrogant golden boy from the ballroom was completely gone. His bowtie was crooked, and there was a faint sheen of sweat on his forehead.
"Audrey," he said. His voice was quiet, lacking its usual condescension.
"Simon." I didn't raise my voice. I didn't move. "Did your father send you down here to finish the job, or did you just get lost looking for the bathroom?"
Simon flinched. He took a step forward, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his trousers.
"My father doesn't know you're in here," Simon said.
I frowned, the calculation in my brain stalling for a second. "What?"
"The security team works for the holding company, but I paid the shift supervisor to pull you out of the ballroom." Simon rubbed the back of his neck, looking away from me. "I needed to talk to you. Alone. Without Malcolm standing there threatening to break my jaw."
I stared at him.
Preston didn't orchestrate this. Simon did. The coward who ran away from me at the bar actually found the nerve to bribe a security team just to get me in a room.
"You locked me in a pantry, Simon," I said, my voice dripping with absolute disgust. "If you wanted to talk, you could have called my lawyer."
"You blocked my number. You ignored my emails." He took another step forward, his desperation bleeding into the small space between us. "I had to do this, Audrey. You don't understand what’s happening upstairs."
"I understand perfectly. You stole my company, you replaced me with a receptionist, and now you’re upset because I didn't quietly disappear."
"It’s not about the company!" Simon’s voice cracked. He pulled his hands out of his pockets, gesturing wildly. "It’s about Malcolm! Do you have any idea what he just did in the library?"
My heart gave a hard, erratic thump against my ribs. "What did he do?"
"He resigned," Simon whispered, the horror in his voice entirely genuine.
"Father tried to use the files on your mother to force him to break the engagement.
He told Malcolm he would leak them to the SEC.
And Malcolm... Malcolm pulled out a flash drive with every illegal transaction the holding company has made in the last decade.
He told Father he would hand it to the feds and burn the entire family to the ground if he ever breathed a word about your mother. "
The air left my lungs in a sharp, painful rush.
I am not going to lose anything that matters.
He knew. Malcolm knew about the files before we even got in the car. He knew Preston was going to blackmail him, and he walked into that library fully intending to throw away his billion-dollar company just to protect my mother’s pride.
"He resigned," I repeated, my voice barely audible.