Chapter 3 - THE MAN WHO OWNED THE HOUSE
Damian Thorne did not ask people questions twice.
Cora learned that the morning after Nero was drugged.
At seven o’clock, six employees stood inside the mansion’s library while Damian sat behind a dark mahogany desk.
Cora had only been inside the main house twice.
The library alone was larger than her old apartment building’s lobby.
Books filled the walls from floor to ceiling.
An antique clock ticked in the silence.
The five employees with security clearance stood in a row.
Cora stood near the door.
Nero remained beside her.
Dr. Hart had advised rest.
Nero had ignored her.
Damian looked at the first employee.
“Did you give Warren Pike access to this property?”
“No, sir.”
Second.
“No.”
Third.
“No.”
Fourth.
“No, Mr. Thorne.”
The fifth man was Calvin Reed, assistant operations manager.
Fortyish.
Perfect hair.
Expensive watch.
The kind of man who always looked as though he had just left a meeting where other people had been told they were replaceable.
Damian looked at him.
“Calvin.”
“No.”
Damian leaned back.
“Then someone is lying.”
Nobody moved.
Cora felt Nero’s body tense beside her.
His attention had fixed on Calvin.
Not aggressively.
Curiously.
Calvin noticed.
“What?”
Cora looked down.
Nero sniffed the air.
Then stepped toward him.
Calvin moved back.
“Control your dog.”
Cora frowned.
“He isn’t doing anything.”
Nero sniffed Calvin’s pant leg.
Calvin shoved him away with his knee.
The room changed.
Cora grabbed Nero’s collar before he could react.
Damian stood.
“Don’t touch him.”
Calvin raised both hands.
“He was on me.”
“He smelled something,” Cora said.
Calvin looked at her.
“Are you accusing me?”
“No.”
“You’re the dog girl. Stay in your lane.”
Cora’s face heated.
Damian’s voice cut through the room.
“Her lane is wherever I tell her it is.”
Calvin fell silent.
Cora crouched beside Nero.
He kept sniffing toward Calvin’s right shoe.
She noticed a faint white powder near the sole.
“Wait.”
Calvin stepped away.
Cora pointed.
“What’s that?”
His eyes dropped.
“Dust.”
“From where?”
“I don’t know. I walked outside.”
Cora rubbed a tiny sample between her fingers.
Chalky.
Dr. Hart came closer.
“Let me see.”
Calvin laughed nervously.
“This is absurd.”
Dr. Hart smelled it.
Then frowned.
“Could be kennel disinfectant.”
Cora looked toward Calvin.
The medication room had been cleaned with powdered disinfectant the previous day.
Damian’s security chief, Marcus Vale, stepped forward.
“Take off your shoes.”
Calvin stared.
“You cannot be serious.”
Damian said nothing.
That was enough.
Calvin removed them.
One sole carried the same blue paint used on the medication-room threshold.
Marcus photographed it.
Calvin’s face changed.
“I was in there three days ago.”
“Records?” Damian asked.
Marcus checked the access log.
“He entered Monday at two thirteen.”
Cora’s stomach sank.
The sedative went missing Thursday.
The shoe proved nothing.
Calvin knew it.
He smiled.
“Are we done?”
Damian studied him.
“For now.”
The employees were dismissed.
Calvin paused beside Cora.
“Be careful.”
She looked up.
His smile remained polite.
“People who become important too quickly usually misunderstand what importance means.”
Nero growled.
Calvin walked away.
Damian waited until the door closed.
“What did you see?”
Cora blinked.
“What?”
“You were watching him.”
“He was nervous.”
“So were four other people.”
“He was angry at being questioned.”
“So were three.”
Cora hesitated.
“When Nero smelled him, he didn’t react like he recognized Warren.”
Damian frowned.
“You think Warren wasn’t here?”
“I think somebody who lives here might have carried something from the kennel.”
Marcus crossed his arms.
“You’re making a lot from a dog sniffing a shoe.”
Cora met his gaze.
“Then don’t make anything from it.”
Marcus looked surprised.
Cora continued.
“Just remember it.”
Damian did.
He remembered everything.
That afternoon, Cora walked Nero through the eastern garden.
He was still sluggish from the sedative.
The estate grounds were almost unnaturally quiet.
She found Damian standing near a pond, throwing pieces of bread toward ducks.
It was such an ordinary thing that Cora almost laughed.
He glanced at her.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re smiling.”
“I’ve never seen a mafia boss feed ducks.”
The words escaped before she could stop them.
Silence.
Cora’s smile disappeared.
Damian stared.
“Oh.”
She swallowed.
“I probably shouldn’t have said that.”
“No.”
He threw another piece of bread.
“But now I know what the staff calls me when I’m not around.”
Cora stared at the pond.
“I don’t think they say it where microphones might exist.”
Damian laughed.
A real laugh this time.
Short.
Surprised.
Nero looked up at him.
Damian crouched.
The dog hesitated, then allowed him to touch his shoulder.
Progress.
“You afraid of me?” Damian asked.
Cora considered lying.
“Yes.”
He nodded.
“Good.”
“That isn’t a compliment.”
“No.”
He stood.
“But fear keeps people observant.”
“So does poverty.”
That silenced him.
Cora looked at the mansion.
“You notice things when one mistake can mean no rent.”
Damian studied her.
“You really dropped out of school to care for your mother?”
Cora’s shoulders stiffened.
“How do you know that?”
“I know who works in my house.”
“You investigated me?”
“I investigate everyone.”
“That’s creepy.”
“It’s practical.”
Cora shook her head.
“Rich people have strange definitions.”
“Of what?”
“Normal.”
Damian looked toward Nero.
“Did she ever recover?”
“My mother?”
“Yes.”
Cora’s voice softened.
“No.”
“I’m sorry.”
“She hated when people said that.”
“What did she prefer?”
Cora smiled sadly.
“She wanted people to say she was funny.”
“Was she?”
“No.”
Damian looked at her.
Cora laughed.
“She was terrible at jokes.”
For a moment, Damian smiled too.
Then Cora noticed something beneath Nero’s collar.
A raised line.
She touched it.
Nero flinched.
“Easy.”
She parted his fur.
There was a long scar underneath.
Not old enough to be from puppyhood.
She looked at Damian.
“What happened?”
He did not answer.
Cora waited.
Eventually Damian sat on a stone bench.
“Nero was mine before Warren ever touched him.”
Cora remained standing.
“He came from a breeder in Kentucky. I bought him at sixteen weeks.”
“Why?”
“Because a man told me I needed a dog.”
“That sounds like you.”
Damian ignored the comment.
“For three years, Nero went everywhere with me.”
He paused.
“Then somebody inside my organization sold my travel schedule.”
Cora listened.
“We were attacked outside a warehouse.”
Damian’s voice remained flat.
“Three men died.”
Cora glanced at him.
“Nero?”
“He took a knife meant for me.”
She looked at the scar.
Damian nodded.
“He survived. After that I let Warren handle his recovery.”
Cora’s stomach turned.
“You trusted him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He had worked with dogs for years.”
“That isn’t the same as caring about them.”
“I know that now.”
Damian looked toward the water.
“When Nero came home, he was different. Warren said trauma had changed him.”
“He lied.”
“Apparently.”
Cora sat on the opposite end of the bench.
“Why didn’t you notice?”
The question was dangerous.
Damian knew it.
Cora knew it.
Still, she asked.
He looked at her for a long time.
“Because I was busy finding the man who sold me out.”
“And?”
“I found him.”
Cora did not ask what happened.
She did not need to.
Damian looked at Nero.
“By the time I looked at the dog again, the damage was done.”
“You can’t undo it.”
“I’m aware.”
“But you can stop adding to it.”
He glanced at her.
“You speak to everyone like this?”
“No.”
“Why me?”
“Because everyone else seems too scared.”
That almost made him smile again.
Then Nero suddenly stood.
His head turned sharply toward the garden path.
Cora heard footsteps.
Calvin Reed appeared carrying a folder.
“Sir.”
Damian’s face closed instantly.
“What?”
“Shipment issue in Memphis.”
He handed him the folder.
Nero sniffed again.
Then backed away.
Cora noticed it.
Calvin noticed her noticing.
“Problem?” he asked.
“No.”
His eyes narrowed.
Damian opened the folder.
Cora looked down at Nero.
Something about Calvin’s scent bothered him.
But not enough to identify.
Not yet.
That night, Cora found a note tucked beneath the windshield wiper of her borrowed staff car.
No envelope.
No signature.
Five typed words.
YOU DON’T BELONG IN HIS HOUSE.
Cora stood beneath the parking-lot light reading it twice.
Then three times.
Nero sat beside her.
She folded the note and put it in her pocket.
She should have told Damian immediately.
She knew that.
Instead she drove back to her room and locked the door.
Because Cora had spent her whole life learning the same lesson poor people learned early.
When someone powerful notices you, sometimes it helps.
May you like
Sometimes it makes you a target.
And Cora Walsh was beginning to understand that she had become both.
