Chapter 5 - The Paranoia Sets In
The air in the vault was rapidly growing thin. Lyra stared at Julian through the impenetrable glass, her mind racing. He had trapped her. He had known she wasn't just a maid.
But Julian didn't press the alarm. He didn't call the guards. Instead, he typed a code into the external keypad, and the vault door hissed open.
Lyra stood frozen, her hand instinctively hovering near the hidden ceramic blade strapped to her thigh beneath the gown.
"Take the mask off, Lyra," Julian commanded, stepping into the vault.
Slowly, she pulled the silver fox mask away.
"I have to admit, you look much better in Tom Ford than in Mrs. Vance’s polyester," Julian said, his eyes scanning the gown, then moving to the empty lockbox. "You took the master ledger."
"Are you going to call security?" Lyra asked, her voice steady, refusing to show fear.
Julian laughed softly. "Call security? And tell my father that a maid outsmarted his multi-million dollar security system? He’d shoot me for incompetence before he shot you." He stepped closer, cornering her against the safe. "What do you want with my father’s ledger, Lyra? Who are you working for?"
"I work for myself."
"Bullshit," Julian spat, his eyes narrowing. "That ledger contains the names of every bribed judge and corrupt senator on my father's payroll. It’s worth billions in blackmail. You're a corporate spy."
"I'm an orphan," Lyra corrected, her voice turning to ice. "An orphan created by Silas Montgomery. He destroyed my family's shipping company twenty years ago. He drove my father to put a bullet in his own head."
Julian paused. The cruelty in his eyes flickered, replaced by genuine surprise. Then, slowly, a slow, dangerous smile spread across his face.
"Well," Julian whispered. "The enemy of my enemy is my maid, it seems."
Lyra frowned. "What are you talking about?"
"My father is a monster, Lyra. He’s planning to leave the entire empire to a blind trust controlled by his cronies, cutting me out completely. I’ve been looking for a way to destroy him for years." Julian extended a hand. "Keep the ledger. But we use it together. We burn Silas to the ground, I take the company, and you get your revenge. Do we have a deal?"
Lyra looked at his outstretched hand. Julian was a snake. He would betray her the second she stopped being useful. But right now, she was trapped in a vault in a house guarded by heavily armed men.
May you like
She shook his hand. "Deal."
"Good," Julian said. "Now, get back into your uniform. Mrs. Vance is doing a head count in ten minutes. If you're missing, they'll lock down the estate."
