Chapter 15 - The Unmarked Manilla Envelope
Twenty miles across the city, Grace sat at the small kitchen table of her new apartment. The room was modest—linoleum floors, a secondhand wooden desk, and walls lined with nursing textbooks—but every inch of it belonged to her. For the first time in years, she did not wake up to the sound of breaking crystal or the cold, humiliating dread of Victoria’s morning commands.
Yet, safety felt like a fragile glass ornament.
Her phone vibrated against the desk. It was Daniel.
"Grace, did you receive any mail this morning? Anything unusual?" Daniel’s voice sounded tight, frayed at the edges.
"No," Grace answered, furrowing her brow as she set down her pen. "Only my university invoices. Why? Has something happened?"
"Claire showed up at Lily’s school. She threw out threats about Victoria having leverage—something predating Lily’s birth. And thirty minutes ago, a courier dropped an unmarked manilla envelope at my corporate office. No postage. Hand-delivered to my floor."
Grace’s stomach plummeted. "What was inside?"
"Photographs," Daniel said, his voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "Of you, Grace. Coming out of your campus library last night. Walking to the subway station. Sitting on a park bench during your lunch break. And on the back of each photo, a time-stamp. They've been watching you for weeks."
Grace stood up abruptly, her chair scraping against the floorboards. Instinctively, she looked toward the street-facing window of her third-floor apartment. Down below, an unfamiliar dark gray sedan was parked along the curb, its tinted windows masking whatever lurked inside.
"They want to intimidate me," Grace said, forcing her voice to remain steady despite the ice creeping through her veins. "They think if they frighten me, I’ll recant the affidavit I gave to child services. They think my testimony can still be bought or buried."
"I’m sending security to your building immediately," Daniel insisted. "Pack a bag, Grace. You can stay in the guest wing at the estate or I can arrange a hotel suite under a corporate alias."
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"No, Daniel," Grace replied firmly, holding her ground. "The moment I hide in your mansion again, Victoria’s lawyers will claim I am on your payroll, that you are harboring me to manufacture testimony. I kept detailed logs of every single day Victoria abused Lily. I kept the flash drives. I am not a servant running from a mistress anymore. Let them take their pictures. Every photo they snap is another piece of evidence for harassment."
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