Chapter 3 - The Voice Inside the Wall
The phone behind the painting kept ringing.
No one moved.
Not me.
Not Victoria.
Not even Lily.
The sound echoed through my office like a countdown.
A hidden phone.
A hidden camera.
A missing maid.
And now a call waiting inside the wall of my own home.
I reached toward it.
“Adrian, don’t.”
Victoria’s voice stopped me.
I turned.
She looked different.
Not like the woman who stood beside me at charity events.
Not like the woman who smiled for cameras and shook hands with billionaires.
This was the woman underneath.
The one who knew something was coming.
“What do you know?” I asked.
She swallowed.
“Too much.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I can give you right now.”
I stared at her.
For years, I had built my reputation on controlling every situation.
Every room.
Every conversation.
Every person.
But that night, inside my own office, I realized I was the only person who didn’t know what was happening.
The phone rang again.
Lily grabbed my jacket.
“Sir…”
I looked down.
Her face was pale.
“What is it?”
She pointed toward the hidden compartment.
“My mama said never answer that phone.”
The words stopped me.
“Your mother knew about it?”
Lily nodded slowly.
“She said if it ever rang, it meant they found out.”
A cold feeling moved through my chest.
“Found out what?”
The little girl looked at Victoria.
Then at me.
“She said you weren’t the person they were trying to hurt.”
Silence.
I looked at Victoria.
“What does that mean?”
Victoria didn’t answer.
That was enough.
I grabbed the phone.
The moment my fingers touched it, the ringing stopped.
A second later, the screen lit up.
Unknown caller.
No number.
No name.
Just one word.
ANSWER.
I pressed the button.
For three seconds, there was nothing.
Then a voice came through.
A man.
Older.
Calm.
Confident.
“Adrian Voss.”
My grip tightened.
“Who is this?”
A quiet laugh.
“You sound exactly like your father.”
My expression changed.
Nobody talked about my father.
Not anymore.
“He died twelve years ago.”
“Yes.”
The voice became colder.
“And that was the first lie they told you.”
I looked at Victoria.
Her face had gone completely pale.
“You know who I am,” I said.
“I know everything about you.”
“Then tell me where Maria is.”
A pause.
Then:
“She was brave.”
My jaw tightened.
“If you touched her—”
“She wasn’t the target.”
“Then who is?”
Another pause.
The voice lowered.
“Ask your fiancée.”
The call ended.
I stood there holding the phone.
The room felt smaller.
Victoria looked away.
That was all I needed to see.
“You knew.”
She closed her eyes.
“Adrian…”
“You knew.”
Her silence was an answer.
I placed the phone on the desk.
Slowly.
Carefully.
Because if I let my anger take over, I would lose control.
And I needed control.
More than ever.
“When did you meet Maria?”
Victoria looked confused.
“What?”
“When did you meet her before she started working here?”
“I didn’t.”
“Wrong answer.”
Her face changed.
“You don’t understand.”
“No.”
I stepped closer.
“I don’t.”
My voice dropped.
“Because every person in this house seems to know more about my life than I do.”
Lily stood quietly near the wall.
Watching us.
A child shouldn’t have been caught in the middle of this.
But she was.
Because adults had failed her.
“Adrian,” Victoria whispered.
“I need you to tell me the truth.”
She looked at the hidden camera.
Then at the phone.
Then finally at me.
“I was investigating your family.”
The words hit harder than I expected.
“My family?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because someone inside your company has been moving money.”
I stared at her.
“My company?”
She nodded.
“Millions.”
I almost laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because it was impossible.
My security systems were designed to catch things like that.
My financial teams were the best in the country.
Nobody stole from me.
Nobody survived trying.
“You’re saying someone has been stealing from me?”
“Yes.”
“And you knew?”
“I suspected.”
“You lied to me.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“No.”
My voice became colder.
“You were hiding something from me.”
She didn’t argue.
Because she knew I was right.
A notification suddenly appeared on my computer screen.
Both of us turned.
A file had opened.
Automatically.
No password.
No command.
Just opened.
A video appeared.
The timestamp was from three nights earlier.
The location:
My office.
The camera angle was different.
Not the hidden camera behind the painting.
Another one.
A camera I didn’t know existed.
The video started.
I watched myself walk into the office.
Then leave.
Then five minutes later…
Maria entered.
She looked terrified.
She carried a folder.
She walked toward my desk.
Then the video froze.
Someone had paused it.
A message appeared.
YOU NEVER ASKED WHAT SHE FOUND.
My heart sank.
I pressed play.
The video continued.
Maria opened the folder.
Inside were documents.
She looked at the camera.
Not knowing who was watching.
Then she whispered something.
No sound.
The audio had been removed.
I turned to Victoria.
“Who edited this?”
She didn’t answer.
Because she was watching the screen.
A tear appeared in her eyes.
Not from sadness.
From fear.
The video ended.
A new file appeared.
One word.
MARIA.
I clicked it.
Inside was a scanned document.
A birth certificate.
I looked at the name.
Then froze.
The child’s name.
Lily Carter.
The mother’s name.
Maria Carter.
The father’s name…
My hand stopped moving.
Because I recognized it.
The signature.
The handwriting.
The date.
Everything.
Victoria saw my face.
“What is it?”
I couldn’t speak.
For the first time in years, I had no answer.
Because the document was connected to a person who had been dead for twelve years.
My father.
I looked at Lily.
The little girl who had walked into my office.
The little girl who knew about the painting.
The little girl whose mother disappeared after trying to warn me.
“Lily,” I said quietly.
She looked up.
“Did your mother ever tell you about my father?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
A long silence passed.
Then she nodded.
“She said he wasn’t the man everyone thought he was.”
The room went still.
My father had spent his entire life being remembered as a businessman.
A philanthropist.
A respected man.
But now a hidden camera.
A missing maid.
And a seven-year-old girl had turned his memory into a question.
My phone vibrated again.
Another message.
This time from the unknown number.
I opened it.
One sentence.
“Ask Lily who was there the night your father died.”
I looked at the little girl.
She was crying now.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
Just silently.
Like she had been holding that pain for years.
I slowly walked toward her.
“Lily.”
She looked at me.
“Who was there?”
Her lips trembled.
She opened her mouth.
But before she could answer, the lights in the office flickered.
Once.
Twice.
Then the security alarm began screaming.
Victoria looked toward the hallway.
Her face turned white.
“Adrian…”
I followed her eyes.
The office door handle started moving.
Slowly.
Someone was trying to enter.
But the door was locked.
Then my security monitor turned on by itself.
A single camera feed appeared.
May you like
It showed the hallway outside.
And the person standing there was wearing Maria’s missing maid uniform.
