Chapter 4 - Auditing the Ghost
By midnight, Rachel was installed in the lavish guest room adjoining Margaret’s private bedchamber.
The room was larger than the entire apartment she had shared with her sister in Syracuse.
Heavy silk drapes covered the bulletproof glass windows overlooking the estate’s dark grounds.
A private bathroom with heated marble floors and gold fixtures stood ready for her use.
Yet Rachel could not bring herself to take off her shoes.
She sat on the edge of the king-sized mattress, listening to the relentless rain drumming against the roof.
Every creak of the floorboards outside sounded like Arthur Vance coming to finish what he started.
At one o’clock in the morning, a soft knock sounded at the sitting room door.
Rachel stood up instantly, her heart hammering in her throat.
The heavy mahogany panel swung open, revealing Mason Bellini.
He had removed his suit jacket and tie, unbuttoning the collar of his black dress shirt to reveal the corded muscles of his throat.
In his right hand, he carried a small glass jar of white medical salve and a roll of clean linen bandages.
Rachel backed up a step, her fingers curling into the hem of her oversized sweater.
“Mister Bellini,” she stammered. “Is... is Mrs. Bellini awake?”
“My mother is asleep,” Mason answered, stepping inside and closing the door with his heel.
He walked past her to the low coffee table, setting down the jar of ointment and the bandages.
“Sit,” he commanded, pointing to the leather sofa.
Rachel hesitated for two seconds before obeying, sitting stiffly on the cushion with her hands pinned beneath her thighs.
Mason pulled up a wooden armchair and sat directly across from her.
Without asking for permission, he reached forward and gently pulled her left arm toward him.
His large hands were warm, calloused, and surprisingly gentle as his fingers wrapped around her palm.
He did not squeeze.
He held her hand with an odd, steady reverence, his thumb resting lightly against her pulse point.
“This will sting for a second,” he warned.
Rachel watched him unscrew the glass jar with one hand, scooping a dollop of thick herbal ointment onto his fingertips.
When he smoothed the cool cream across the dark purple bruises on her wrist, a sharp gasp caught in her throat.
Mason paused, looking up through his thick eyelashes to meet her eyes.
“Breathe, Rachel,” he said quietly. “I am not him.”
Rachel exhaled slowly, watching as his scarred thumbs carefully massaged the medicine into her damaged tendons.
“Why didn't you run away after the first time he grabbed you?” Mason asked, his voice low and rhythmic.
“I had nowhere to go,” Rachel admitted, her voice trembling in the quiet room.
“My sister is facing eviction next month.”
“Her baby needs medicine I couldn't afford on minimum wage at a diner.”
“Your estate paid five thousand a month.”
“I thought... I thought if I just kept my head down, he would forget I saw anything.”
Mason’s jaw tightened, the lines around his mouth hardening into stone.
“Men like Vance do not forget,” Mason said, beginning to wind the clean white bandage around her wrist with steady precision.
“They use fear the way other men use currency.”
“He knew you had no family of status to protect you.”
“He picked you because he thought your life was cheap enough to discard whenever he finished laundering my father’s ghost accounts.”
Rachel looked at the neat white wraps covering her bruised flesh.
“Did you find the book?” she asked.
Mason tied off the bandage with a clean, efficient knot before releasing her hand.
“His office safe was empty when I went down there two hours ago,” Mason said, leaning back into his chair.
“The bastard keeps the physical ledger somewhere off the estate grounds.”
“He knows I am watching him now.”
“When I called him into the library for a midnight briefing on our port shipping manifests, he didn't blink.”
“He sat there smiling, offering his condolences about my mother’s migraine, playing the devoted family retainer.”
“He even had the audacity to suggest that our staff needed a background audit because petty jewelry had gone missing from the laundry rooms.”
Rachel felt cold panic flood her veins once more.
“He is setting me up to look like a thief.”
“He is trying to create an excuse to have the local police drag you out of this house,” Mason confirmed coldly.
“And once you are in a county transport van, an accident happens on Highway 9.”
Rachel covered her mouth with her uninjured hand, her eyes welling with helpless tears.
“What am I going to do?” she wept softly.
Mason leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees, closing the distance between them until she could smell the cedarwood and dark tobacco clinging to his skin.
“You do nothing,” Mason said, his voice dropping into a dark, unbreakable promise.
“You stay in this wing.”
“You let my mother pour you tea.”
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“And you remember that as long as you are under this roof, Arthur Vance cannot touch a single hair on your head without answering to my gun.”
Rachel stared into his fierce, unyielding gaze, feeling an overwhelming, terrifying sensation of safety inside the lion’s den.
