Chapter 1 - The Little Boss
The little girl pointed across Damon Ashford’s desk and shouted: “I’m the boss now!”
Damon stopped beside a leather portfolio holding a forty-million-dollar acquisition contract.
A tiny pink fingerprint marked the bottom corner.
Beside it, someone had drawn three crooked lines.
The middle line formed a door.
Damon suddenly realized she wasn’t playing.
For several seconds, nobody moved.
Three-year-old Lily Carter occupied the enormous leather chair behind Damon’s mahogany desk as if she had been born to it.
One pink Mary Jane shoe was missing. A crooked bow leaned sideways in her dark curls. Her small legs were crossed, and one white sock had slipped halfway toward her ankle.
Behind her stood her mother, Naomi Carter.
Naomi looked horrified.
“Mr. Ashford, I’m so sorry.”
Damon raised one hand.
Naomi stopped.
His eyes remained on Lily.
He had spent most of his adult life making people nervous. Investors prepared before entering his office. Executives rehearsed presentations for weeks. Men twice his age changed their tone when Damon Ashford walked into a conference room.
Lily appeared unimpressed.
She pointed at him again.
“You sit there.”
She indicated the upholstered chair opposite the desk.
Damon glanced at Naomi.
Naomi looked as though she wanted the marble floor to swallow her.
“Lily,” she whispered. “That’s Mr. Ashford’s chair.”
“No.”
Lily patted the leather armrest.
“My chair.”
Something unexpected happened.
Damon smiled.
It was small, almost reluctant, but Naomi noticed.
She had worked in Ashford House for fourteen months and had rarely seen her employer smile at anything that wasn’t a successful business negotiation.
“All right,” Damon said. “For how long?”
Lily considered the question.
“Till snack.”
“A reasonable term of office.”
Naomi covered her face briefly.
“I’ll take her downstairs.”
She stepped forward.
Lily immediately straightened.
“No, Mama. I got orders.”
Damon’s eyebrow lifted.
“Orders?”
Lily nodded seriously.
“Yes.”
He slowly sat opposite her.
“Then I suppose I should hear them.”
Naomi stared at him.
“Sir, you really don’t have to encourage—”
“It’s fine.”
Damon leaned forward, forearms resting on his knees.
“What’s your first order, Boss?”
Lily’s smile vanished.
The change was so sudden that Damon noticed immediately.
She pointed toward the right side of the study.
Beyond the wall lay the east corridor.
“Open the locked room.”
Naomi froze.
Damon’s smile disappeared.
“What locked room?”
“The one over there.”
Lily pointed again.
Damon followed her finger.
There were several rooms along the east wing: an unused music room, two guest suites, a storage room, and his late grandfather’s archive.
Most were rarely used.
None should have interested a three-year-old.
Naomi crouched beside her daughter.
“Sweetheart, what are you talking about?”
“The man’s room.”
Damon looked at Naomi.
Naomi looked genuinely confused.
“What man?”
“The night man.”
The study became very quiet.
Damon rose.
“Lily.”
She looked at him.
“What night man?”
“The man who comes when you sleep.”
Naomi’s face lost color.
Damon felt something cold move through him.
Children invented things. Damon knew that.
Lily believed stuffed rabbits became lonely if left downstairs overnight. Last week she had informed the cook that the moon followed their car because it liked her.
But there was something different in her expression now.
She wasn’t inventing a story for attention.
She was remembering.
Damon crouched until they were almost eye level.
“Where did you see him?”
Lily pointed toward the east hallway again.
“After Mama sleeps.”
Naomi stared at her.
“You were out of bed?”
Lily nodded.
“Needed Bunny.”
Her stuffed rabbit had apparently been left downstairs.
“What did the man look like?” Damon asked.
“Big.”
“That describes half the security staff.”
Lily frowned.
“He walks funny.”
“How?”
She climbed down from the chair.
Her missing shoe made her demonstration naturally uneven, but she deliberately dragged her right leg behind her.
Damon’s amusement disappeared completely.
“Like that?”
“Yes.”
Naomi looked at him.
“Do you know someone who walks that way?”
Damon did.
Or rather, he had.
Walter Crane, his father’s longtime financial administrator, had walked with a permanent right-leg limp after a riding accident.
Walter had died eleven years ago.
Damon stood abruptly.
“That’s impossible.”
Lily returned to the chair.
“He has a shiny stick.”
“A cane?” Naomi asked.
Lily nodded enthusiastically.
“Gold bird.”
Damon’s stomach tightened.
Walter Crane’s cane had possessed a brass eagle handle.
Damon had seen it hundreds of times as a boy.
After Walter’s death, the cane had supposedly been buried with him.
“Mr. Ashford?”
Naomi’s voice brought Damon back.
He walked toward the desk and pressed the intercom.
“Marcus.”
A voice answered.
“Yes, sir?”
“Come to my study.”
“Immediately.”
Damon released the button.
Naomi picked up Lily’s missing shoe from beneath the desk.
“I’m sure there’s an explanation.”
“There usually is.”
Damon looked toward the east hallway.
“The question is whether I’ll like it.”
Two minutes later Marcus Reed entered.
Forty-six, former military police, broad-shouldered and methodical, Marcus had supervised Ashford House security for six years.
Damon trusted him more than most relatives.
Marcus noticed Naomi and Lily.
“Problem?”
“Pull security footage from the east corridor for the last thirty nights.”
Marcus frowned.
“Specific time?”
“Midnight through four.”
“Why?”
Damon glanced at Lily.
“A witness.”
Marcus followed his gaze.
Lily waved.
Marcus almost smiled.
Then Damon said, “She says someone has been entering Grandfather’s archive at night.”
Marcus stopped smiling.
“That room is sealed.”
“So I thought.”
“Only you have authorization.”
“And you.”
Marcus nodded.
“Biometric access. No key override except emergency maintenance.”
Lily interrupted.
“He has a key.”
All three adults looked at her.
“A shiny one,” she added.
Marcus stared at Damon.
“I’ll check immediately.”
“No.”
Damon stood.
“We check together.”
The east corridor felt different now.
Damon had walked it thousands of times.
Today he noticed everything.
A faint scrape near the baseboard.
A disturbance in the carpet.
And outside the archive door, a tiny object.
Pink.
He bent down.
Lily’s missing sneaker.
Naomi gasped.
“Lily!”
The child smiled.
“My shoe.”
Damon picked it up.
“How did this get here?”
Lily looked toward the archive door.
“The man found me.”
Naomi went rigid.
“What?”
“He said little girls shouldn’t walk at night.”
Damon felt anger replace unease.
“He spoke to you?”
“Yes.”
“What else did he say?”
Lily’s forehead wrinkled.
“He said don’t tell Mama.”
Naomi pulled Lily against her.
Marcus stepped to the electronic panel.
“No unauthorized entry logged.”
“Open it.”
Marcus entered his credentials.
Red light.
ACCESS DENIED.
He tried again.
Same result.
“That’s impossible.”
Damon placed his thumb against the scanner.
Red.
ACCESS DENIED.
Someone had locked the owner of the house out of his own archive.
Damon looked at Marcus.
“Override it.”
Marcus removed the panel cover.
As he worked, Lily tugged Damon’s sleeve.
“What?”
She pointed downward.
A thin black thread protruded beneath the door.
No.
Not thread.
A cable.
Marcus saw it too.
“Camera line.”
“There shouldn’t be a camera inside.”
“There shouldn’t be anything powered inside.”
The lock clicked.
Marcus looked at Damon.
“Ready?”
Damon nodded.
Marcus opened the door.
Darkness.
Damon reached for the switch.
Lily suddenly screamed.
“No!”
Everyone stopped.
She buried her face against Naomi.
Damon crouched.
“Lily?”
Her tiny hand emerged and pointed into the darkness.
“He knows.”
“Who knows?”
“The night man.”
Damon turned.
Something illuminated at the far end of the archive.
A monitor.
Then another.
Then twelve.
Every screen showed a different room inside Ashford House.
Damon’s bedroom.
His study.
The kitchen.
Naomi’s quarters.
Lily’s room.
Marcus whispered, “My God.”
One screen showed them standing outside the archive in real time.
Someone had been watching.
Damon stepped inside.
A message suddenly appeared across the central monitor.
WELCOME HOME, DAMON.
Then another line began typing beneath it.
I’VE BEEN WAITING ELEVEN YEARS.
Damon stared at the screen.
May you like
Behind him, the archive door slowly began to close.
And from somewhere inside the darkness, a man’s cane struck the floor once.
