Chapter 5: Before the Sun Comes Up
The lake house had three bedrooms.
Nathan put Lily in the smallest one, which had a low bed and a quilt with faded blue squares.
Grace sat on the edge of the mattress until Lily's breathing slowed and deepened.
Then she stood carefully and pulled the door to.
Nathan was in the kitchen, his laptop open, two cups of coffee on the table.
"Sit down," he said.
"I need to know everything.
From the beginning."
Grace sat.
She wrapped both hands around the mug.
"I met your father eight years ago," she said.
"I was working as an administrative assistant at Cole Industries.
Not in your division — in the legal records department on the fourth floor.
Your father used to walk through on his way to the east stairwell.
He stopped one morning and asked me a question about a filing.
We talked for twenty minutes." She paused.
"He was kind.
That's what I remember.
He seemed genuinely kind."
"He could be," Nathan said.
"Go on."
"We spoke a few more times over the following months.
Nothing inappropriate.
He was simply — attentive.
He asked about my background, my family.
I told him I had no one in the city.
He seemed to file that away." She looked at her coffee.
"I think that's why he chose me."
"Chose you for what?"
"To approach about you." She looked up.
"He came to my apartment one evening.
He said he had a proposal.
That you were twenty-nine years old, that you were brilliant but isolated, that you had difficulty forming real connections because of how you had been raised.
He said he was worried about you." A small, humorless breath.
"He asked if I would be willing to spend time with you.
He would arrange an introduction.
He said he wasn't asking me to do anything dishonest — just to be open to a friendship that might become more."
Nathan was very still.
"He arranged for us to meet."
"The charity gala.
The one where we were seated at the same table.
I thought it was coincidence." She shook her head.
"He had placed us there."
"And you went along with it."
"I was twenty-six years old and completely alone in this city.
Your father was the most powerful man I had ever spoken to.
And he was kind about it.
He made it sound like he was doing me a favor." Her jaw tightened.
"I was not naive enough to think it was entirely selfless.
But I thought — I thought if something real came of it, then it didn't matter how it started."
"Something real did come of it," Nathan said.
"Yes." She set down the mug.
"And then I found out I was pregnant.
And I told your father before I told you, because I was frightened and he had always seemed like someone who would know what to do." Her voice dropped.
"That was the last kind conversation we ever had."
"What did he say?"
"He said congratulations.
He held my hand.
He told me everything would be fine." She looked at the table.
"Three days later, the courier arrived with the envelope and the photographs and the list of everything he knew about my life.
And a document for me to sign.
A non-disclosure agreement.
Fifty thousand dollars and my silence, or he would ensure I was removed from the country and Lily — he used the word Lily, he already knew I had chosen a name — would be placed in state care while the legal process ran."
The kitchen was very quiet.
"He knew the name," Nathan said.
"He had been watching me for months." She looked up.
"I signed the document.
I took the money.
I used it to disappear to a city three hours away and raise Lily alone for four years.
And then I ran out of money, and I needed work, and the only reference I had was from Cole Industries' legal department.
So I applied for domestic positions." She held his gaze.
"I didn't know it was your house.
I applied through an agency.
I didn't see your name until the day I arrived."
"And you stayed."
"I needed the work." A beat.
"And then I saw you.
And you were — you were exactly the person I had hoped you might be, back when I still thought things could be simple." She looked away.
"I told myself I would save enough to leave again.
I gave myself three more months."
Nathan's phone buzzed.
Daniel Marsh.
He answered it.
"Tell me."
"The warrant is real," Daniel said.
"Signed this evening.
They're planning to execute it at six a.m.
— they'll go to your house first, and when she's not there, they'll start looking.
Nathan, I need to know where you are."
"Lake house.
The Alderton subsidiary property."
"They won't find that quickly, but they will find it.
I need you to bring Grace to my office by seven a.m.
I have a colleague — family law, very good — she can file an emergency injunction before the warrant is executed.
It won't stop everything, but it buys us time."
"What do we need?"
"The trust amendment document.
The original letter from Edward.
And Grace needs to write down everything she just told you — dates, names, the NDA, the courier, all of it.
Tonight, if possible.
Handwritten is fine.
We'll formalize it tomorrow."
Nathan looked at Grace.
"Can you do that?"
She was already reaching for the notepad on the table.
"Yes."
"Daniel — the unknown number.
Someone has been sending me information.
They knew about the police liaison visit before I did."
A pause.
"I may know who that is.
I'll explain tomorrow.
Don't respond to those messages yet."
The call ended.
Grace had already started writing.
Her handwriting was small and precise, the pen moving steadily across the page despite the hour and the pain still visible in the set of her shoulder.
Nathan watched her for a moment.
"Your shoulder," he said.
"We should look at it."
"After I finish this."
"Grace—"
"After," she said, without looking up.
He found a first aid kit under the bathroom sink.
He brought it to the table and set it beside her without a word.
She glanced at it, then back at the page, and kept writing.
At 4:40 a.m., Lily appeared in the kitchen doorway in her socks, holding the edge of the quilt.
"I'm thirsty," she said.
Nathan got up and poured her a glass of water.
He carried it to her and crouched down to her level.
She drank half of it and handed it back.
Then she looked at him with those steady dark eyes.
"Are you going to stay?" she asked.
Nathan looked at her for a long moment.
"Yes," he said.
"I'm going to stay."
Lily considered this.
Then she turned and padded back down the hallway to her room.
Grace had stopped writing.
She was looking at the empty doorway.
"She's never asked anyone that before," she said quietly.
Nathan set the glass in the sink.
"Then it was time someone answered."
His phone lit up again.
The unknown number.
*They moved the warrant execution up.
May you like
Five a.m.
Leave now.*
