Chapter 5
Story: The Heir Wrapped His Blazer Around the Cleaning Woman His Fiancée Was Mocking
The morning came too fast.
Nadia woke with a cramp in her neck from falling asleep sitting up, the book still open on her chest, the lamplight still burning yellow in the gray dawn. She lay still a moment, letting the night come back to her in pieces: the heel clicking on the marble, the laughter moving down the table, the weight of the blazer settling on her shoulders. She reached for her phone on the bedside table.
The message was still there. *The glass is still on the table. I have not touched it. — D.C.*
She had not answered it. She did not know if she was supposed to. She sat up slowly and looked at the door of her niece's room, and then she walked down the hall in her bare feet and looked at the blazer hanging on the hook.
The ring was still in the pocket. She had not imagined it.
Her phone buzzed again. This time it was not a message — it was a call. The same number. She stared at it for a long moment, and then she answered.
"Miss Reyes." The voice was low and unhurried, the same voice that had said *Stand up. Now.* "I hope I didn't wake you."
"You didn't." Her own voice came out too small. She cleared her throat. "Mr. Calloway."
"I want to thank you," he said, "for last night. The way you handled yourself. The way you kept your head down." There was a pause, the kind of pause he had let hang before he answered a question. "I also want to ask you something. And I need you to answer honestly."
The kitchen was cold. Nadia wrapped the blazer around herself without thinking — it was too big, and the cedar smell rose up around her like a held breath.
"Ask," she said.
"What did you see, Miss Reyes? Before the wine went over. What did you see that made your hands shake?"
The silence on the line stretched. Outside, the first bus of the morning rattled past on the wet street. Nadia stood in the cold kitchen with the heir's coat on her shoulders and the truth in her mouth, and she thought about the capsule sitting under the table leg, and the glass sitting untouched at his place, and the two thousand dollars it would cost to repair the wine stain on the marble if the hotel decided to charge her.
"I saw the wine go over," she said carefully. "I saw the table leg move. I saw your glass stay full."
"And before that," Darius said. "Before the table leg moved. Did you see anything at your eye level? Anything small?"
The question hung in the air between them. Nadia's fingers tightened on the lapel of the blazer. The ring in the pocket was a hard weight against her hip.
"I'm a cleaner," she said. "I see the floor."
"Miss Reyes." His voice was not impatient, but there was iron in it now. "I am asking you because I need to know, and I will not hurt you for telling me the truth. I will hurt people who lie to me about it."
The kitchen was very quiet. A car went by in the rain. In the other room, Mia's voice called out for her aunt, sleepy and demanding. And Nadia looked at the black blazer around her shoulders, and she made a choice.
"I saw her fingers graze the base of your glass," she said. "I saw something small and black drop in. Then I saw your cousin move his foot against the table leg, and the wine went over, and the glass stayed full because you never reached for it."
The silence on the other end of the line went on so long that she thought he had hung up. Then he said, very quietly: "And the capsule. Do you know where it is now?"
"It was under the table leg when I left. Half hidden in the wine." She took a breath. "I didn't touch it. I didn't tell anyone."
"You told me," Darius said. There was something almost like warmth in his voice now. "That's more than I expected. Hold onto the coat, Miss Reyes. And whatever happens today, you stay out of the hotel. Do you understand me?"
"Yes."
"Good." There was a sound like a chair scraping back. "I have to go. There's a meeting I was going to skip, but I think I should attend after all."
He hung up. Nadia stood in the cold kitchen with the phone in her hand and the blazer around her shoulders, and she heard her niece's voice calling her name from the bedroom, and outside the rain was still falling.
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