13. Lena #2
“The killer planned this.” Marsh flipped through her notes, reading from a page I couldn’t see.
“The security cameras covering that corridor and the storage area had been malfunctioning for three days prior. We checked the maintenance logs and interviewed the technicians. The cameras weren’t broken.
They were deliberately disabled by someone who knew exactly which feeds to target and how to make it look like a technical failure. ”
“Who has access to the security systems?” Her partner finally spoke. He was young, with an earnest face that hadn’t yet learned to hide what he was thinking. The kind of cop who probably still believed in justice and truth and the basic goodness of people.
Michael pulled out his tablet, already scrolling through files.
“Maintenance staff have physical access to the camera housings. Security team members have access to the monitoring software. Upper management can override certain functions.” He tapped a few times, then turned the screen toward the detectives.
“I can send you a complete list of everyone with credentials, along with their schedules for the past two weeks.”
“Please do.”
“Ms. Hughes.” Marsh turned her attention to me, her sharp eyes assessing. “We’re pursuing several investigative angles, including the possibility of organized crime involvement. Your husband’s associates have come up in our preliminary inquiries.”
Of course they had. Raphael’s security team moved through the hotel with their earpieces and coordinated precision, and his Russian contacts had visited in their expensive suits, their eyes cold and assessing. From the outside, it probably looked exactly like the mob had moved in.
“My husband’s security team was hired to protect the hotel after the previous incidents,” I said carefully. “They’ve been cooperating fully with your investigation.”
“So I’ve noticed.” Marsh’s tone was neutral, but doubt surfaced in her expression.
Skepticism, maybe. Or professional wariness about wealthy people who thought their money placed them above the law.
“Four incidents since the beginning of the year, each one worse than the last. That’s quite a pattern of escalation, Ms. Hughes. ”
“Stephanie had been here for thirty-three years.” I kept my voice steady. “Whatever’s happening at this hotel, it started long before my marriage.”
Marsh wrote something in her notebook, the pen scratching across the paper.
“We’re looking into all possibilities. In the meantime, I would strongly recommend additional security measures.
Whatever’s happening here isn’t random. Whoever did this knew the hotel layout intimately.
Knew the victim well enough to arrange a private meeting. Knew exactly how to avoid detection.”
Someone inside.
“We’ll be in touch as the investigation develops,” Marsh said, rising from her chair. “Don’t leave town, Ms. Hughes. We may have additional questions.”
I didn’t bother pointing out that I lived here now. That this hotel was my entire world. That leaving wasn’t an option, even if I had wanted to.
The drive home was silent.
I sat in the back seat of the car and watched Paradise Peaks scroll past the tinted windows.
Cute shops with artisanal signs drifted by, then tourists in expensive hiking gear, then normal people living normal lives, completely unaware that someone in my hotel had killed a woman who had been kind to me. I hadn’t seen it coming.
My hands were shaking again. I pressed them flat against my thighs and focused on breathing. In through the nose. Out through the mouth. The way Sophie had taught me during one of our spa sessions, back when my biggest problem was learning to manage my father’s expectations.
Someone inside. Someone Stephanie trusted. Someone who had planned this for days, disabling cameras, waiting for the perfect moment, feeding her blood through my fountain before leaving her body to be found. Someone who wanted me afraid.
They were succeeding.
The manor appeared through the trees, stone and shadow and iron gates that should have been a prison. I waited for the familiar wave of resentment at the sight of it.
It didn’t come.
Instead, when I saw his car in the driveway, my shoulders relaxed. Relief. Real and impossible to deny and completely irrational. He was home. He was here. And somewhere in the chaos of the past two days, that had started to feel like safety.
My body had already made its decision. I could feel it in the warmth gathering low in my belly, the way my breath quickened at the thought of being near him. Eight weeks of hating this man, and my body still craved him like he was the only cure for what ailed me.
I didn’t want to examine it.
I went upstairs without seeing Alice or anyone else.
Showered until the water ran cold, scrubbing my skin raw, trying to wash off the day.
Tried to eat the dinner Alice left at my bedside, but my stomach rebelled at the sight of food.
The roast chicken sat untouched, congealing in its own gravy, while I paced my room and listened to the manor settle around me.
I could hear him moving below. His study door. The hallway. Then his footsteps stopped, and the manor went quiet in that particular way it did when he was standing still, listening, deciding.
The first stair didn’t creak. Neither did the second.
I told myself I was relieved. Told myself I needed space to process everything. Told myself that last night had been a mistake, a moment of weakness, something that wouldn’t happen again.
The lies tasted bitter on my tongue.
I lay in my bed and stared at the ceiling, waiting for sleep that wouldn’t come. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Stephanie’s wilting roses. The red water in the fountain.
The fear crawled under my skin, into my bones, wrapping around my chest until I couldn’t breathe.
I could call Clara. Or Sophie. But neither of them could fix this. Neither of them could make me feel safe. Neither of them could chase away the shadows that had taken up residence in my head.
Only one person had done that. And I hated that it was true.
I was out of bed before I made a conscious decision. Down the stairs, the floor cold under my bare feet. Through the hallway, my heart pounding so loud I was sure he could hear it. His study door was closed, warm light leaking from the gap at the bottom.
My hand rose to knock.
The door opened before I could.
He stood in the doorway, dressed in dark slacks and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair was slightly disheveled, as if he had been running his hands through it. His eyes found mine immediately, dark and intent, reading the fear I couldn’t hide.
He didn’t speak. Didn’t ask questions. Just stepped aside and let me in.
“I couldn’t sleep.” My voice sounded small. Lost. Nothing like the woman who had demanded his body last night, who had used him to burn away her fear.
He closed the door behind me.
The study was warm, a fire burning low in the grate, casting dancing shadows across the leather furniture and the dark wood paneling. His desk was covered in papers, a half-empty glass of whiskey beside his laptop. He had been working. Or waiting.
Maybe both.
“I don’t…” I stopped. Swallowed. Started again. “I don’t know what I’m doing here.”
“I know.”
The same words he had said last night. But different now. Last night they’d been acknowledgment, acceptance of what I was using him for. Tonight they sounded like permission. Like understanding.
He moved toward me slowly. Giving me time to refuse. His hand rose to cup my face, and I waited for the instinct to flinch, to pull away, to reject the tenderness I wasn’t ready for.
It didn’t come.
His palm was warm against my cheek. His thumb brushed across my cheekbone, slow and gentle, and my defenses gave way. A fissure in the wall I had built between us.
I could feel his eyes on me, dark and patient, waiting to see what I would do. Last night I had pushed him onto his back and used his body like a weapon. Tonight I had nothing left to fight with. Just the cold ashes of grief and terror, and the desperate need to feel something other than alone.
I leaned into his touch.
His expression changed. Careful. Like a man holding his breath.
He didn’t push. Didn’t take. Just stood there with his hand on my face and let me set the pace, the way he had last night, the way he did everything with me now. Waiting. Patient. As if I was worth waiting for.
I kissed him.
Soft this time. Not the angry collision of last night, but slower. Searching. His lips parted under mine, and I tasted whiskey and warmth, and my throat went tight.
He led me through the hallway to his bedroom. The sheets were clean, the bed made with military precision, but his scent was everywhere.
This time was different.
He undressed me slowly, his hands gentle where they had been urgent before. I let him. Let myself be touched without demanding, without controlling, without hiding behind the physical to avoid the emotional. His mouth traced down my neck, and I shivered, but not from the cold.
His fingers found the hem of my shirt and lifted it over my head with a reverence that made my breath catch. He looked at me like I was something worth memorizing. Like he wanted to map every inch of skin and commit it to memory in case I never let him this close again.
I reached for him. Unbuttoned his shirt with hands that trembled, not from fear but from the terrifying intimacy of wanting this. Wanting him. Not as a weapon or a distraction, but as a man I was beginning to trust.
When he lowered me onto the bed, his weight settled over me like shelter.
His mouth found mine again, and this kiss was different.
Unhurried. Thorough. He kissed me like we had all the time in the world, like there was nothing waiting outside this room, no murder investigation, no mysterious threat, no complicated history between us.
His hand slid down my body, and I arched into his touch.
He knew exactly where to press, where to stroke, where to linger until my breath came in gasps and my fingers dug into his shoulders.
But he didn’t rush. Every touch was deliberate, patient, drawing out the pleasure until I was shaking with it.
“Look at me,” he said, his voice rough.
I opened my eyes. Met his gaze in the low light.
When he entered me, slow and deep, I didn’t look away. Neither did he. We watched each other, and I saw the vulnerability he usually hid. The desperation. The way his jaw clenched with the effort of holding back, of letting me set the pace even when his body clearly wanted more.
He moved inside me with that same maddening patience, each thrust slow and thorough, hitting a place that made my vision blur. My hands found his back, his shoulders, the muscles that flexed and tensed beneath my palms.
My fingers caught on something. Ridges. Raised lines cutting across his shoulder blade, parallel and deep. Scars I had never registered before, or maybe scars I had touched without really knowing. I traced one with my fingertip, and he went still above me.
“What—” I started.
He kissed me before I could finish the question.
Deep and thorough, his tongue sliding against mine, and whatever I had been about to ask dissolved in the heat of his mouth.
His hips rolled, hitting that spot that made my thoughts scatter, and by the time I could think again, my hands had moved to his shoulders, gripping instead of exploring.
Later. I would ask later.
I could feel him holding himself in check, feel the restraint coiled in every line of his body.
“You can let go,” I whispered.
His control snapped. Not shattered, but cracked enough that his next thrust was harder, deeper, and I gasped at the intensity of it. His forehead dropped to mine, our breath mingling, and whatever wall I had built between us cracked without warning.
The pleasure built differently this time. Not sharp and frantic like last night, but slow and overwhelming, rolling through me in waves that grew stronger with each breath. His eyes never left mine, and I couldn’t look away, couldn’t hide behind closed lids and pretend this was just physical.
When the orgasm hit, it wasn’t like anything before. It started deep in my core and radiated outward, crashing through me with an intensity that stole my breath and my thoughts and my carefully maintained distance. I heard myself cry out, my body arching against his.
Then came that strange, impossible swelling.
The same pressure from last night, locking us together at the peak, making it impossible to separate even if I had wanted to.
This time I didn’t fight it. I let myself feel the fullness, the pulsing heat, the way his body seemed designed to hold me exactly where I was.
He followed me over the edge with a groan that vibrated through my chest, every pulse of his release reverberating through me while we stayed locked together, trembling, breathing each other’s air.
But it was the tears that surprised me. Sliding down my temples into my hair while the aftershocks still pulsed through me. Not from sadness. From release. From the terrifying vulnerability of letting someone see me like this, stripped of pretense.
He kissed them away without comment. His lips soft against my temples, my cheeks, the corners of my eyes. No questions. No demands for explanation. Just acceptance.
After, he wrapped himself around me.
His arm heavy across my waist. His chest warm against my back. His breath evening out, slow and steady, stirring the hair at my nape. A sound rumbled from his chest, low and unfamiliar, a vibration I felt more than heard. Almost like a purr. I didn’t know what it meant.
I should leave. That’s what I had done last night. Dressed in the dark and retreated to my own room, keeping the walls intact, maintaining the distance I needed to survive this arrangement.
But the fear was still there, lurking at the edges of my mind. And here, wrapped in his arms, surrounded by his scent, it was smaller. Manageable. Like something I could carry instead of something that was carrying me.
Five more minutes. That’s what I told myself. Five more minutes and then I would go.
His arm tightened around me, pulling me closer against his chest. His heartbeat was slow beneath my ear. Too slow, too steady, inhuman in its calm, but it only made me safer.
The warmth seeped into my bones. The tension I had been carrying for days began to loosen, muscle by muscle, breath by breath. My eyelids grew heavy.
Five more minutes.
I was asleep before I finished the thought.