“Now?” Ruth asked.

“I cannot sit here and wait,” I said. “I need to see what he did with my own eyes.”

“I will stay here with Claire,” Ruth said. “The doctors said she won’t wake up for a few hours.”

“If anything changes, call me immediately,” I said.

“I will, Daniel.”

I walked quickly down the hall toward the elevators.

The drive back to the Whitmore estate was long and dark.

The headlights of my car sliced through the sheets of heavy rain.

The windshield wipers moved back and forth with a rhythmic, scraping sound.

I thought about the five years Claire had spent in exile.

She had lived in small, cheap apartments.

She had worked menial jobs, always looking over her shoulder.

She must have believed I was a monster.

Yet, she had still come back.

She had accepted a job as a silent housekeeper, hiding her face, just to watch our sons grow.

I turned the car onto the long gravel driveway of the estate.

The grand Tudor house stood dark against the stormy sky.

The old oaks in the front yard swayed violently in the wind.