By sunrise, Boston had chosen its villain.
Billy knew because her phone wouldn’t stop vibrating.
Video of Sabine pouring wine over her had escaped from the gala.
Someone had uploaded a twenty-two-second clip.
By six in the morning, millions of people had watched it.
But another video appeared shortly afterward.
This one showed Billy watching Sabine for months.
Edited footage.
Courtyard clips.
Security-camera stills.
A photograph of Billy’s investigation file.
The caption called her an obsessed hotel employee who had infiltrated the Windmir to blackmail a celebrity designer.
By seven, strangers were debating whether Billy had staged the entire humiliation.
By eight, reporters were outside her mother’s house.
Deardra watched through the curtains.
“People really have nothing better to do?”
Billy almost laughed.
Then someone banged on the front door.
Rafe’s security moved immediately.
It was Marisol.
Billy opened the door.
Marisol walked in carrying coffee and a paper bag.
“You look terrible.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
She put breakfast on the table.
Then hugged Billy.
Billy hadn’t expected it.
Her composure broke.
Only for a moment.
Marisol held her.
“You should have told me.”
“I couldn’t.”
“I know.”
They sat.
Rafe stood near the kitchen window.
He had barely spoken since discovering the forged agreement.
Billy still didn’t know whether she trusted him.
But he hadn’t left.
Marisol said, “Puit is gone.”
Rafe turned.
“What?”
“He disappeared from security custody during the police transfer.”
Rafe’s expression darkened.
“How?”
“One of the officers received paperwork saying he was being released.”
“From whom?”
“Nobody knows.”
Billy looked at Rafe.
“Somebody is still protecting this.”
“Yes.”
“Sabine?”
“Maybe.”
Billy shook her head.
“Sabine is running too.”
Rafe looked at her.
“You think she’s afraid.”
“My father said she was.”
Billy remembered the recording.
Sabine had been crying.
If Vincent finds out I gave you this—
For four years, Billy had imagined Sabine as a monster.
Maybe she was.
But monsters could also be afraid of bigger monsters.
Deardra rolled into the room.
“Sabine came here once.”
Billy turned.
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
“What?”
“She came after midnight.”
Billy stared at her mother.
“You never told me.”
“I told her to leave.”
“Why did she come?”
“She wanted the file.”
Billy laughed bitterly.
“Of course.”
“No.”
Deardra shook her head.
“She wanted me to destroy it.”
“That’s worse.”
“She was terrified.”
Billy stopped.
Deardra continued.
“She said Vincent was dead but the system he created wasn’t. She said Kroll had records that could destroy dozens of people.”
“Why didn’t she go to police?”
“She said she had participated.”
Rafe spoke quietly.
“She would have implicated herself.”
“Yes.”
Billy looked at her mother.
“Did she apologize?”
Deardra’s eyes hardened.
“No.”
That mattered.
Fear explained choices.
It did not erase them.
Sabine had still stolen.
Still profited.
Still humiliated Billy.
Still poured wine over a woman she believed powerless.
Billy said, “Then we expose all of it.”
Rafe looked at her.
“Not yet.”
She turned.
“Excuse me?”
“The ledger needs authentication.”
“My father died for that ledger.”
“And if we release it badly, Kroll’s lawyers will call it fabricated.”
Billy stood.
“So we wait?”
“We build a case.”
“That sounds convenient for the man whose name is on the ownership papers.”
Rafe flinched.
Good.
Billy wanted him to.
“You think I signed them?”
“I think I don’t know you.”
“That’s fair.”
His calm irritated her more.
“You could deny it.”
“I already did.”
“You could get angry.”
“I am angry.”
“You don’t look angry.”
Rafe stepped closer.
“My whole life, people have expected me to prove anger by breaking things.”
His voice remained quiet.
“I learned not to give them the satisfaction.”
Billy looked away.
He continued.
“I was twenty-four when that agreement was signed. Vincent handled several family trusts in my name. He had access to signature specimens.”
“You’re saying he forged it.”
“I’m saying we prove whether he did.”
“How?”
Rafe held up his phone.
“Original banking records.”
He had requested archived documents from the institution that processed the foundation transfer.
The records arrived that afternoon.
The signature was electronic.
Authorized from an account linked to Rafe.
But the authentication device had been registered to Vincent Santangelo’s office.
Rafe had been in California on the transaction date.
Hotel records and flight manifests proved it.
Billy exhaled.
“You didn’t sign it.”
“No.”
She sat.
For reasons she didn’t want to examine, relief moved through her.
Rafe noticed.
“You look disappointed.”
“Don’t flatter yourself.”
That almost-smile appeared again.
Then his phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered.
A woman spoke.
Rafe put it on speaker.
Sabine.
“Billy there?”
Billy leaned forward.
“Yes.”
Silence.
Then Sabine said, “I need you to listen.”
Billy’s anger returned instantly.
“I listened when you told me to learn what I was.”
Sabine breathed out.
“I deserved that.”
“No. You deserved worse.”
“I know.”
Billy hadn’t expected agreement.
Sabine continued.
“Kroll has Priya.”
Rafe stood.
“What?”
“He took her because she has the surviving footage.”
Billy’s stomach dropped.
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect us to believe that?”
“No.”
Sabine’s voice cracked.
“I expect you to hate me.”
Billy said nothing.
“But if you want Priya alive and the records intact, you need to understand what Kroll is doing.”
“Tell us.”
“He’s leaving Boston.”
“When?”
“Tonight.”
“With what?”
“Everything Second Thread collected for fourteen years.”
Billy closed her eyes.
Hundreds of designers.
Hundreds of stolen beginnings.
Sabine said, “He has a private warehouse near the harbor.”
Rafe asked for the address.
Sabine gave it.
Billy said, “Why help us?”
Another silence.
“Because Thomas Ror gave me one chance to tell the truth.”
Billy’s chest tightened.
“And I didn’t take it.”
Sabine’s voice became smaller.
“I’ve regretted it every day.”
Billy thought of the ballroom.
“You didn’t look regretful last night.”
“No.”
“Why did you pour the wine?”
Sabine was quiet for several seconds.
“Because I recognized you.”
“I know.”
“And because Kroll was watching.”
Billy frowned.
“What?”
“He was at the sponsor table.”
Billy remembered.
Edwin Kroll had been sitting ten feet away.
Sabine continued.
“He knew who you were too. When you stopped after seeing the gown, I knew you recognized it.”
“So you humiliated me?”
“I panicked.”
“That’s your excuse?”
“No.”
Her voice broke.
“It’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever done.”
Billy looked at Rafe.
Sabine continued.
“I thought if I made you look insignificant, Kroll would believe you were insignificant.”
Billy felt sick.
“You could have warned me.”
“I had spent fourteen years becoming the kind of person who didn’t warn people.”
There it was.
Not redemption.
Not yet.
Just truth.
Rafe asked, “Where are you?”
“I’m coming in.”
“No.”
“Rafe—”
“Kroll wants you too.”
“I know.”
“Then stay hidden.”
Sabine laughed softly.
“You always thought you could protect everyone by giving orders.”
“And you always thought you could survive anything by controlling the room.”
“Looks like we were both wrong.”
The call ended.
Rafe stared at the phone.
Billy studied him.
“You loved her?”
He took a long time answering.
“I loved who I thought she could become.”
Billy understood that more than she wanted to.
That evening, police and federal investigators moved toward the harbor warehouse using evidence Rafe’s attorneys had turned over.
Billy was ordered to stay home.
She lasted nineteen minutes.
Marisol caught her putting on a coat.
“No.”
Billy looked at her.
“Not you too.”
“Absolutely me too.”
“My father spent four years trying to get those records.”
“And he’d probably tell you not to walk into a warehouse full of criminals.”
“My father apparently didn’t follow his own advice.”
“That doesn’t make it good advice.”
Billy smiled despite herself.
Then her phone buzzed.
A photograph.
Priya.
Tied to a chair.
Behind her was a wall of garment bags.
The message read:
BRING THE LEDGER.
NO POLICE.
Billy’s blood went cold.
A second message arrived.
COME ALONE, OR SHE PAYS FOR YOUR FATHER’S MISTAKE.
Billy looked at Marisol.
Then at the black ledger on the kitchen table.
Twenty minutes later, Billy was gone.