Chapter 4
I looked at Sybilla.
She looked genuinely confused.
Good.
Another layer.
“You knew about the camera?”
“No.”
I believed her.
One of the men swore under his breath.
Also interesting.
“You?”
He shook his head.
They had been told to hide.
Wait for me.
Restrain briefly.
Then reveal the “exercise.”
No camera mentioned.
So who placed it?
Elias checked the device.
No live broadcast.
No recording yet.
Timer scheduled for eleven.
Three minutes after entry.
Pointed toward the bed.
Not the door.
Not security.
Something else.
Then we found the second part.
A woman’s evening wrap draped across the bed.
Not Sybilla’s.
A pair of heels beneath the chair.
And a champagne glass with lipstick on the rim.
Staging.
My stomach went cold.
This was not simply a breach test.
Someone intended to create a compromising bedroom scene.
Man enters.
Camera activates.
Female belongings visible.
Perhaps a woman enters later.
Photographs.
Then what?
I looked at Sybilla.
Her face had gone white.
“Whose things?”
“I don’t know.”
One of Vane’s men spoke.
“We were told a cleaner would prepare the room.”
Cleaner.
Maid.
Of course.
If discovered early, blame household staff again.
I looked toward the door.
“Estelle.”
The entire structure suddenly made sense.
Not necessarily the woman.
The access trail.
Her name on the guard reassignment.
Her job gave her reason to enter the room.
If something compromising appeared upstairs, records would show Estelle moved guards and accessed the suite.
Perfect scapegoat.
But for what?
A fake affair?
Why during my engagement?
Then Sybilla whispered:
“My father wouldn’t do this.”
I turned.
“Wouldn’t he?”
She looked at the camera.
Then the heels.
Her certainty broke.
That interested me.
Maybe Sybilla knew about the staged security failure.
Not the second plan hidden inside it.
Which meant someone was using her father’s plan as cover for their own.
May you like
One conspiracy nested inside another.
Family craftsmanship.
