Chapter Six: : Not as Hidden as I Thought

Emma’s POV

The suite phone kept ringing.

I scrambled for my mobile first, Tom’s voice still coming through the speaker, low and steady as he asked if I was still there.

Without answering, I ended the call and shoved the phone beneath the pillow before reaching for the internal line. My hand wasn’t nearly as steady as I wanted it to be.

“Yes?”

Dana’s voice came through, crisp and composed. “Ms. Winston, Mr. Hammer asked me to inform you that the household schedule has been adjusted. You’ll be required at the board reception on Thursday evening. Black formal attire. Hair up is preferred. I’ll have a car waiting at six-forty.”

I forced myself to take a slow breath. “Understood.”

There was a brief pause before she spoke again.

“Is everything all right in the suite? The call registered as unanswered for longer than usual.”

“I was in the bathroom,” I replied, keeping my voice as even as possible.

“Of course.” Another pause, just long enough to make it clear she had noted the timing. “Good night, Ms. Winston.”

The line went dead.

I sat on the edge of the bed with the internal phone still in my hand and stared at the closed suite door. The mobile under the pillow felt like evidence. I pulled it out, checked that the call had fully disconnected, and then wiped the recent log. Old habit. Necessary habit. My pulse was still too high.

Tom Reilly had known about the personal guarantee. He had known about the settlement three weeks later. Those details had never appeared in any public record I had spent years collecting. Either he had a source inside the creditors’ process, or he had something closer to the Hammer side than I wanted to think about.

I texted Julian through the encrypted channel.

Reilly already knows about the guarantee and the settlement timing. He approached me. I didn’t give him anything. Call dropped because of internal line. Dana checking in.

His reply came in under a minute.

Pull back. Hard. If he’s that far along, someone is feeding him. Don’t give him another reason to look at you. Archive stays cold for at least a week. Confirm.

I typed: Confirmed.

Then I sat in the dark with the phone in my lap and tried to decide whether I believed my own answer.

The restricted folder was still sitting behind that gray lock in the household archive. Fourteen months. The clock had already started the moment I signed the prenup. Pulling back felt like surrender. It also felt like the only way to keep the access I had worked so hard to get.

I forced myself through the rest of the night the way I always did when the risk climbed too high. I showered again, changed into soft clothes, and mapped the public creditors’ transcript one more time against the timeline I already knew by heart. My mother’s name on page four. The absence of any mention of the guarantee. The clean footnotes. The version the lenders had been willing to leave on record. Nothing new. Nothing that explained how Tom Reilly already knew the parts that had been scrubbed.

Sleep came late and shallow.

……………

The next morning the penthouse felt different. I left the east suite at seven-fifteen and found the main living area already occupied.

Will stood at the long glass wall with a coffee in one hand and his phone in the other, scrolling with the same controlled focus he brought to everything. He was dressed for the office—dark suit, no tie yet, the faint scar along his jaw catching the early light. He did not look up when I entered.

Dana was at the kitchen island with a tablet, updating something that required her full attention. She glanced once in my direction, gave a short nod, and returned to the screen.

I poured black coffee and leaned against the opposite counter. The silence stretched.

Will finally spoke without turning. “Thursday reception. Six-forty departure. You’ll stand with me for the photographs and the first twenty minutes of conversation. After that you can leave if you want.”

“Understood.”

He turned then. His eyes moved over my face the way they had the morning after the wedding—quick, assessing, filing details. “You look tired.”

“I slept fine.”

“No,” he said quietly. “You didn’t.”

I held his gaze and did not answer. Something in his expression shifted, almost like he had expected the evasion and was noting it for later.

Dana cleared her throat. “Mr. Hammer, the car is downstairs when you’re ready.”

Will finished the coffee in one swallow, set the cup down, and walked past me toward the private elevator. He paused just long enough to say, “Keep the low profile. Dana will handle the rest of the week’s schedule.”

Then he was gone.

Dana waited until the elevator doors closed before she spoke. “He’s more observant than most people give him credit for. If you’re going to keep secrets in this house, make sure they’re better than the ones he already suspects.”

I looked at her over the rim of my mug. “Is that a warning?”

“It’s an observation.” She closed the tablet and tucked it under her arm. “The archive access is still active under your spouse profile. Restricted folders remain locked. Any unusual activity will still route to me first. Clear?”

“Clear.”

She left without another word.

I stood alone in the quiet penthouse, staring at the city beyond the glass. The restricted folder lingered in my mind like a locked door I’d been given a key ring for, but not the key itself. Tom Reilly already knew pieces of the story I’d spent years trying to prove. Julian was warning me to pull back, while Will was watching me more closely than I’d anticipated.

Fourteen months.

I finished my coffee, rinsed the cup, and returned to the east suite to resume the careful, uneventful business of looking like a woman with no interest in restricted files.

For three days, I barely left the suite. I reviewed public records I already knew by heart and answered Julian’s check-ins with brief assurances that the archive remained untouched. I accessed the household terminal only once, just long enough to confirm that the grayed-out Winston Transfer folder was still where I’d left it.

No searches. No access attempts. Nothing that would give Dana a reason to look closer.

Will maintained his distance. We crossed paths in the hallway twice, and both times he offered a brief nod before walking away. Dinner trays arrived without notes, and the staff moved through the penthouse with quiet efficiency.

My request for privacy was being treated as an order. Everyone seemed content to leave me alone.

On the fourth morning, I noticed something was different.

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️