Chapter 4 - The Midnight Return
Standing perfectly still in the arched doorway of the living room was Elaine.
Her arms were crossed over her cream satin blouse, her eyes narrowed with lethal, venomous suspicion as she watched her daughter and her mother whispering. Nola quickly forced a polite smile, waved goodbye, and walked out the heavy front doors into the freezing winter evening.
But Nola didn't drive back to her apartment.
She parked her car three blocks away and waited in the freezing darkness. She knew her mother’s habits perfectly. Elaine always drank two glasses of expensive red wine and took a heavy sleeping pill at exactly 10:00 PM.
At midnight, Nola crept back onto the massive family estate. She used the spare emergency key she had kept hidden on her keychain for years. She slipped silently into the dark, echoing house, moving like a ghost toward Elaine’s private home office.
If Elaine had switched the envelope, the original contents had to be somewhere in this room.
Nola clicked on a small penlight, holding it between her teeth as she expertly picked the lock on Elaine’s heavy mahogany desk drawer. She had learned how to bypass that exact lock when she was a teenager looking for confiscated cell phones.
The drawer slid open.
Laying right on top of a stack of overdue credit card bills was the original cream-colored envelope. The gold foil seal was violently ripped open.
May you like
Nola’s heart hammered against her ribs. She reached inside with trembling fingers and pulled out a thick stack of stapled, highly official legal documents.
👉 Nola read the first page of the hidden documents, and the horrifying truth turned her blood to absolute ice.
