Chapter 2 - THE VIDEO VANESSA BURIED
For several seconds, nobody in the ballroom seemed capable of breathing.
Nate stared at me.
His hands rested motionless on the wheels of his chair.
“What did you say?”
Vanessa was fighting the security guards now.
“She’s insane! Nate, don’t listen to her!”
I ignored her.
“I said there’s video from the night you fell.”
“That’s impossible.”
His voice had become dangerously calm.
“The cameras malfunctioned.”
“They didn’t.”
“They were offline.”
“No. Someone deleted the recordings.”
Vanessa’s father, Charles Sterling, shoved his way through the crowd.
Charles was a real-estate billionaire with the kind of smile that disappeared whenever there wasn’t a camera nearby.
“This has gone far enough.”
He pointed at me.
“Remove this employee immediately.”
Nate didn’t look at him.
“Don’t.”
Charles blinked.
“Nathaniel—”
“I said don’t.”
The guards stopped.
Nate turned his attention back to me.
“Where did you get it?”
“My brother worked for the company that maintained the security system at your house.”
Vanessa laughed too loudly.
“Oh, wonderful. So now the maid and her brother are blackmailers.”
“I didn’t ask you for money.”
“Because you were waiting for a bigger audience!”
“Vanessa.”
Nate’s voice was soft.
She looked at him.
“Be quiet.”
That seemed to shock her more than anything else.
Nate faced me.
“Continue.”
My brother Mateo had taken the Harrington maintenance job six months earlier because his small security company needed the contract.
Three days after Nate’s staircase accident, one of Vanessa’s assistants called him privately.
She offered him thirty thousand dollars to permanently wipe the local camera backup.
Mateo refused.
The following morning, Harrington security terminated his company’s contract for “performance deficiencies.”
Two days later, his van was vandalized.
A week after that, someone filed an anonymous complaint accusing him of stealing client data.
His business collapsed within a month.
“But he kept a copy,” Nate said.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he was scared.”
Vanessa scoffed.
“Convenient.”
I turned toward her.
“He died before he could decide what to do with it.”
That silenced even her.
Mateo had been killed eight weeks earlier when a delivery truck ran a red light and struck his motorcycle.
Police ruled it an accident.
I had accepted that.
Mostly.
Until I opened a sealed envelope Mateo had left in our mother’s safe.
Inside was the flash drive.
A handwritten note was wrapped around it.
ELENA — IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, DO NOT GIVE THIS TO THE HARRINGTON SECURITY OFFICE.
GO DIRECTLY TO NATE.
I hadn’t known how.
A billionaire was not a man you simply called.
Three weeks later, I learned the Grand Meridian needed temporary staff for Nate’s charity gala.
I applied.
Vanessa looked at me differently when I finished.
Not angry anymore.
Afraid.
Nate saw it too.
“Project it.”
Charles Sterling stepped forward.
“No.”
Nate finally looked at him.
“Excuse me?”
“This is a charity event, Nathaniel. Whatever garbage that woman has manufactured can be handled privately.”
“My alleged attempted murder seems fairly private already.”
Vanessa flinched.
“Nate, please.”
It was the first time she sounded vulnerable.
“I love you.”
He looked at her for a long moment.
“Then you should be eager to prove her wrong.”
The event technician connected the drive to the ballroom projection system.
Vanessa tried to leave.
Security blocked her.
Charles pulled out his phone.
Nate’s attorney, Miriam Cho, appeared beside him.
“Charles, I strongly suggest you keep your hands visible and your phone in your pocket.”
“You’re threatening me?”
“I’m preserving evidence.”
The ballroom lights dimmed.
The giant screen behind the stage turned black.
Then a timestamp appeared.
11:43 P.M.
HARRINGTON RESIDENCE — WEST CORRIDOR.
The video had no sound.
Nate’s wheelchair appeared first.
He was moving slowly toward the staircase landing.
Vanessa came behind him.
The room collectively leaned forward.
On the screen, Vanessa was arguing.
Her arms moved sharply.
Nate turned his chair around.
He pointed down the hallway.
Vanessa stepped closer.
Nate tried to move past her.
She grabbed the back of the chair.
Present-day Vanessa shouted, “TURN IT OFF!”
Nobody moved.
On-screen Vanessa pulled Nate backward.
His chair struck the wall.
He shoved her hand away.
She came around in front of him.
Then she slapped him.
A woman near the front table covered her mouth.
On-screen Nate reached for his phone.
Vanessa grabbed it and threw it down the stairs.
Then she positioned herself behind his wheelchair.
Nate’s face in the ballroom went gray.
He whispered, “No.”
On the recording, Vanessa released the wheelchair brakes.
She shoved.
Nate disappeared over the edge.
His chair flipped.
His body struck the stairs.
Once.
Twice.
Then vanished from the camera’s view.
People screamed.
Vanessa on the recording looked down the staircase.
She didn’t run for help.
She waited.
Thirty-eight seconds.
Then she bent down, picked up Nate’s phone, and smashed it against the banister.
Only after that did she run downstairs.
The footage ended.
Nobody applauded.
Nobody whispered.
Nobody even seemed to know what kind of reaction was appropriate.
Nate stared at the blank screen.
I saw his fingers trembling.
He had spent six months believing his body had betrayed him.
Believing he had caused his own fall.
Believing Vanessa had found him and saved his life.
She had told him that story repeatedly.
I knew because interviews about their “love after tragedy” had been everywhere.
Vanessa had described herself as the woman who heard him fall and rushed to help.
She had cried on television.
Now Nate finally looked at her.
“You pushed me.”
“Nate—”
“You stood at the top of those stairs while I was bleeding.”
“I panicked.”
“You destroyed my phone.”
“I wasn’t thinking!”
“You told me I fell.”
Tears rolled down Vanessa’s face.
Real tears.
They didn’t help her.
“I was scared.”
“Of what?”
“Of losing you.”
His laugh was empty.
“So you tried to kill me to avoid losing me?”
“That isn’t what happened!”
Charles stepped in.
“My daughter needs an attorney.”
Miriam nodded.
“She certainly does.”
Vanessa looked around the ballroom.
Faces that had admired her an hour earlier now recoiled.
Guests began pulling out phones.
One woman removed the engagement-party favor from her purse and placed it on the table.
Then Nate did something I hadn’t expected.
He turned toward me.
“Was that the only file?”
“No.”
Vanessa’s head snapped toward me.
Nate noticed.
“What else is there?”
I hesitated.
Because the second video was worse in a completely different way.
“Mateo recovered audio from your home office.”
Vanessa screamed.
“DON’T!”
Nate’s eyes never left mine.
“What audio?”
I inserted another file.
Vanessa started sobbing.
Her father looked ready to collapse.
And when the recording began, it wasn’t Vanessa’s voice we heard first.
May you like
It was Charles Sterling’s.
“Once you marry him,” he said, “we don’t need him competent anymore.”
