Chapter 11: The CCTV Phan

[ DAVID'S POV ]

The clock on the dashboard showed it was past midnight when I finally shut off the engine. I did not get out of the car right away. I just sat there in the quiet, looking up at the massive shape of my house.

The entire estate was brightly lit. High-tech security lamps flooded the stone driveways with clean, white light. The perfectly cut gardens practically glowed under the expensive landscape lighting. It looked exactly like what it was the grand home of a multi-millionaire. But as I looked at the beautiful stone walls, the wealth did not make me feel good.

I had spent the last fourteen hours at the corporate office, buried under stacks of business files. I told myself I stayed late because the work was important. But deep down, I knew it was a lie. I just did not want to come home. I did not want to walk through the front doors and feel the strange, cold weight that had been hanging over the house for the last two days.

My chest felt empty and hollow as I finally grabbed my briefcase and stepped out into the night air.

Inside, the grand foyer was washed in the soft, warm glow of the dimmed crystal chandelier. The smart-lighting system was working perfectly, illuminating the massive marble pillars and the expensive artwork on the walls. The house was bright, but it was dead quiet. I walked up the grand staircase, my shoes making a dull sound against the polished stone. As I walked down the long, bright hallway toward my private study, my eyes automatically shifted toward the far end of the house. The East Wing.

That was where she was. Samantha.

A sharp spark of anger flared up in my chest, but right behind it came a wave of pure annoyance. It had been forty-eight hours since I locked her away in that empty storage room. Two whole days with absolutely no food, no water, and no contact with anyone. I had given strict orders to the entire staff: Treat her like a ghost. Do not speak to her. Let her rot until she breaks.

I pulled off my tie with a rough jerk, pushing open the door to my study. The lights here turned on automatically the moment I stepped inside. I dropped my briefcase onto the leather couch.

In my mind, I already knew what I was going to see when I checked on her. Linda had told me everything. She said Samantha was a greedy liar who used her father to trap me and steal my family's wealth. I expected to see a girl who was furious that her little trap had failed. A girl like that would not just sit quietly in a dark room. No, she was probably throwing a fit. She was probably scratching at the door, crying fake tears, or searching the room for a way to escape. She was probably trying to find a way to sneak into the main house to cause more trouble.

"Let's see what games you are playing now," I muttered to myself.

I sat down in the heavy chair behind my desk. I woke up my laptop, clicked on the security system icon, and typed in my private password. The screen split into many small squares, showing different angles of the mansion. I clicked on the camera for the East Wing storage room.

The screen went full size, but it was completely black. Unlike the rest of the mansion, that specific room had no windows, and the night vision on this old camera was too blurry to see anything clearly. I frowned, my fingers tapping against the desk. I wanted to see her face. I wanted to see the panic in her eyes when she realized she could not escape.

I moved my mouse to the smart-home control panel on my screen. I hovered the arrow over the light switch for that specific room. With one loud click, I turned on the overhead light from my computer.

The video feed flickered, and suddenly the storage room was bright. I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the desk, fully expecting to see her pacing around like a trapped animal or curled up weeping on the floor.

.

Instead, I froze.

Samantha was sitting perfectly straight on the edge of the mattress.

She was not crying. She was not scratching at the walls. She did not even look up at the bright bulb that had just snapped on above her head. She was just sitting there, her back straight, her chin held up, staring blankly at the empty wall in front of her.

I stared at the screen, my breath catching in my throat. The bright light showed the sharp lines of her face. She looked terribly thin. Her cheeks looked hollow, and her lips were dry and split from the intense lack of water. Under the harsh light, I could see the dark, heavy shape of the bruise on her jawline, the mark my own fingers had left when I slammed her against the wall in my blind rage.

But there was no anger on her face. There was no fear, no madness, and no guilt.

She sat with a strange, quiet dignity that completely shocked me. It was the look of someone who had been stripped of absolutely everything her family, her 

freedom, her safety but refused to let her spirit be broken. She looked completely clean, completely innocent, despite the dirt on the floor around her.

I felt a sudden, sharp ache in my chest. My heart gave a heavy, uncomfortable thud.

If she was the greedy villain who planned this whole thing, where was the panic? A liar who got caught would be begging for mercy. A fake gold-digger would be screaming for help, trying to negotiate, or throwing a tantrum because her plan failed. But Samantha was just sitting there in absolute silence, enduring the hunger and the isolation with a calm that felt almost holy.

She did not look like a monster who set a trap. She looked like the one who had been trapped.

I leaned closer to the monitor, my fingers gripping the edge of the desk so tightly my knuckles turned white. I could not take my eyes off her. She was like a phantom on the screen, a ghost that was starting to haunt my conscience.

For the last two days, I had been completely sure of my anger. I had been certain that I was doing the right thing by punishing the girl who tried to ruin my family. But looking at her now, sitting perfectly still under the bright light with so much silent pride, a cold hand of doubt wrapped around my throat.

What if I am wrong? What if she was just a pawn her father threw away?

The thought popped into my head like a flash of lightning, cold and terrifying. I looked at the dark purple bruise on her jaw, then back to her calm, hollow eyes. The empty feeling inside my chest grew wider, turning into a deep, heavy pain. I closed my laptop slowly, the screen going dark, but the image of her sitting under that light stayed burned into my mind.