Chapter 6

He Finally Saw Me

I woke briefly inside the medical helicopter.

Someone had cut away my clothes. Warm blankets covered my body. An IV line ran into my arm while a medic spoke into a headset.

Gideon sat beside me.

“The card,” I murmured.

His hand closed around mine.

“Safe.”

“Don’t give it to Roman.”

“I won’t.”

Only then did I let my eyes close.

By the time Roman returned to the arena floor, the helicopter had carried me away.

The steel enclosure stood empty except for broken chains and blood.

Roman stared at the place where I had fallen.

Behind him, Arthur spoke with a voice stripped of all warmth.

“You sent her here.”

“I sent her to Halcyon.”

“As if that makes it better.”

“I was told it was controlled.”

“You knew what kind of men operated it.”

Roman turned.

“I never authorized this.”

Eleanor stepped between them, tears streaming down her face.

“She begged you to check the cameras.”

Roman said nothing.

“She asked you for five minutes,” Eleanor continued. “You gave her a sentence instead.”

Gideon’s security team began collecting computers, payment records, and guest identities. The federal liaison photographed every face in the arena before anyone was permitted to leave.

Roman looked toward Marcus.

“Lock down both compounds.”

Marcus hesitated.

“Under whose authority?”

Roman’s gaze turned lethal.

“Mine.”

Gideon’s lieutenant stepped forward.

“No. This is a Vale investigation now.”

Roman faced him.

“If you waste time arguing jurisdiction, evidence will disappear.”

“He’s right,” the federal liaison said. “Preserve the servers. Nobody leaves the island.”

Roman’s men moved.

So did the Vale team.

For the first time, they were working toward the same goal without trusting one another.

Roman found Darius, Blake, and Serena attempting to reach a service tunnel beneath Red Haven.

They were dragged into the control room.

Banks of monitors covered the walls. On one screen, Roman saw archived footage from Halcyon Ridge.

A girl in a torn evening dress was being hauled away from a fence.

The girl was me.

Roman stepped closer to the monitor.

“Play it.”

Marcus did.

My voice came through the speakers, raw with panic.

“Roman! Uncle Roman!”

The recording showed him turning.

Then Celeste walked directly into his line of sight.

She touched his arm and guided him away while a guard dragged me toward the basement.

Roman watched the footage twice.

On the third viewing, he noticed Celeste glance back.

She had seen me.

She had known.

“Where is she?” Roman asked.

No one needed clarification.

Celeste had remained at Halcyon Ridge with her children, claiming the arena would frighten them.

Serena dropped to her knees.

“Mr. Blackwood, I can explain.”

Roman turned toward her.

“Why was Evelyn transferred?”

“Darius approved it.”

Darius swore.

“She offered to buy the girl.”

“Who offered?”

Serena glanced at the armed men surrounding her.

“No one.”

Roman picked up a tablet from the desk and opened the transaction log.

A payment of two hundred thousand dollars had entered one of Serena’s shell companies on the night of my transfer. The originating account belonged to a trust recently created for Celeste Marlowe.

Roman’s face became unreadable.

“What did Celeste ask you to do?”

Serena shook her head.

Roman placed my bloodstained signet ring on the table.

The black stone reflected the monitor’s cold light.

“I will ask once more.”

Serena stared at the ring.

“She wanted Evelyn moved somewhere you wouldn’t search.”

“Why?”

“She said the girl had threatened her family.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

Serena’s breath quickened.

“She wanted her gone.”

“Gone from the estate?”

Serena closed her eyes.

“Gone permanently.”

Roman stood motionless.

The truth was in front of him, but it did not erase his own choice. Celeste had manipulated the destination. Darius and Blake had inflicted the harm. Marcus had failed to deliver the protection order.

But Roman had put me on the plane.

He had refused to examine the footage.

He had noticed my silence and decided his wedding mattered more.

Roman turned to Marcus.

“Find every person who touched her. Every viewer who paid. Every employee who altered a record.”

Marcus’s face was gray.

“And then?”

“Secure them for the investigation.”

Eleanor’s warning rang in Roman’s memory. Evie had almost died because people with power treated human lives as private property. More secret violence would only make him another part of the same machine.

“Preserve everything,” Roman added. “No disappearances. No executions. They answer in court, where every name becomes public.”

Marcus nodded.

Roman left for Halcyon Ridge.

Halfway there, Eleanor called him from the aircraft transporting me to the United States.

“The doctors stabilized her.”

Roman gripped the phone.

“Is she awake?”

“Not anymore.”

“What did they say?”

Eleanor was silent for several seconds.

“Multiple fractures. A gunshot wound that was never properly treated. Severe infection. Malnutrition. Signs of repeated assault.”

Roman closed his eyes.

“There are drugs in her bloodstream they haven’t identified yet. Her heart rhythm is unstable.”

“I’m coming home.”

“No.”

He opened his eyes.

“What?”

“She panicked when she saw you.”

“I need to see her.”

“What you need no longer matters.”

The call ended.

Roman stared through the windshield as the gates of Halcyon Ridge appeared ahead.

Dr. Lina’s bloodstained coat was still in the basement corridor, but her body was gone. A maintenance log claimed she had died during interrogation and been transferred to the facility crematorium.

There was no record of the cremation.

Roman ordered the entire medical wing sealed.

Then he entered Darius’s office.

A framed photograph of Halcyon Ridge hung behind the desk. In it, wealthy donors smiled beside a sign promising dignity, discipline, and renewal.

Roman tore it from the wall.

Beneath the frame was a recessed safe.

Inside were passports, cash, several encrypted drives, and a handwritten transfer ledger.

My name appeared on the last page.

Beside it was Celeste’s signature.

Roman photographed the entry and sent it to the federal liaison.

His phone rang again.

This time, it was the security director at Blackwood Estate.

“Mr. Blackwood, Ms. Marlowe has requested the jet.”

“Denied.”

“She says her son is ill and needs a specialist in New York.”

“There are three physicians on the estate.”

A pause.

“She’s also ordered the surveillance archive erased.”

Roman’s expression hardened.

“Lock down the house. No one leaves.”

He returned to the United States before dawn.

At Vale House in the Hudson Valley, Gideon had converted the entire second floor into a private medical unit. Specialists worked in rotating shifts. Armed guards controlled the gates.

Roman’s convoy was stopped before it reached the main drive.

Gideon came outside alone.

“How is she?” Roman asked.

“Alive.”

“I want to see her.”

“No.”

“She responds to my voice.”

“She survived in spite of your voice.”

Roman absorbed the blow without reacting.

Gideon stepped closer.

“Her parents trusted you with their daughter and their companies. You failed at both.”

“I’ll return everything.”

“You think this is about money?”

“No.”

“Then don’t come here offering things she already owns.”

A nurse ran through the front doors.

“Mr. Shaw!”

Gideon turned.

“Her vitals are dropping.”

He sprinted inside.

Roman followed before the guards could stop him.

Upstairs, alarms sounded from behind a glass medical door. Doctors surrounded the bed.

I twisted against the sheets, trapped in a nightmare.

“I’m not lying,” I cried. “Roman is my guardian. Please call him.”

A doctor tried to keep the IV line from tearing free.

“No one believes me. He’ll come. He promised.”

Roman entered the room.

“Evie.”

My body went still.

He approached the bed slowly.

“I’m here.”

My hand moved toward his voice.

For one brief second, my fingers closed around his.

Then I began to shake.

“The juice,” I gasped. “She poured it on me.”

Roman froze.

“I know.”

“You didn’t ask.”

“I know.”

“You sent me away.”

My heart monitor accelerated.

Gideon shoved Roman back as the medical team intervened.

Roman left before his presence could hurt me again.

He flew directly to Blackwood Estate.

Celeste met him in the entrance hall with her son in her arms.

Her face was pale, but her voice remained soft.

“Roman, thank God. Noah has a fever. I’ve been trying to get him to a hospital.”

Roman touched the boy’s forehead.

“Have Dr. Pierce examine him.”

Celeste searched his expression.

“Did you find Evie?”

“Yes.”

“Is she all right?”

Roman looked at her for a long moment.

“No.”

Celeste’s eyes filled with tears.

“I’m so sorry.”

He wanted to close his hands around her throat.

Instead, he kissed Noah’s forehead and called for the physician.

“You should stay with your children tonight,” he told her.

Celeste mistook his restraint for uncertainty.

She relaxed.

Roman went upstairs and watched every recovered recording.

He saw Celeste spill the orange juice over me.

He saw her delete the dining-room footage.

He saw her recognize me at the private dinner.

He saw her send Serena a message while I was being dragged away.

Move her tonight. Roman must never find her.

By midnight, Celeste realized the house was too quiet.

She carried her sleeping children to a guest suite, locked the door, and made a call from a hidden phone.

“Serena?”

No answer.

Celeste tried again.

Still nothing.

She opened the tracking application connected to the phone she had given Serena. The signal came from Halcyon Ridge’s underground holding area.

If Serena spoke, everything was over.

Celeste slipped out through the servants’ corridor, using an emergency access code she had stolen from Roman’s office. She drove to the private airfield and boarded a maintenance flight before the estate guards realized she was gone.

Three hours later, she entered Halcyon Ridge through the medical wing.

Serena was alone in an interrogation room, cuffed to a metal chair.

Celeste dismissed the guard by claiming Roman wanted a private confession.

When the door closed, Serena looked up.

“You promised to protect me.”

“I tried.”

“They have the payment records.”

“I know.”

Serena began to cry.

“I’ll tell them everything.”

Celeste pulled a pistol from her bag.

“That’s what I was afraid of.”

Serena stared at the weapon.

“The girl’s suffering was your idea.”

“And you were paid very well.”

“I won’t die for you.”

Celeste raised the gun.

“No,” she said. “You’ll die for my children.”

Her finger tightened against the trigger.

The interrogation-room door crashed open.

Roman stood on the other side, his face colder than Celeste had ever seen it.

His gaze moved from the gun to Serena’s restraints.

Then back to Celeste.

“I sent Evie into hell because I believed you,” he said.

He stepped into the room.

“And you still decided that wasn’t enough.”