Chapter 4 - Flight Through the Mist
The heavy French doors yielded with a loud bang as Clara threw her shoulder against the brass latch. Cold autumn air rushed into her lungs, searing her throat as she scrambled down the gravel pathway into the estate's sprawling hedges. Rain had begun to fall, a steady gray drizzle turning the manicured grass slick.
""Mommy, where are we going? Who was that mean lady?"" Daisy cried against Clara’s neck, her small velvet dress instantly soaking through the freezing drizzle.
""Shh, baby, hold on to Mommy. Hold tight, don't look back,"" Clara whispered frantically, her soaked flats skidding across the wet stones. Her lungs burned. She had spent five years running, living out of cheap motels and remote coastal cottages, always keeping one foot out the door. She had only taken the catering gig because Daisy required experimental treatment for an inherited congenital heart defect—a defect only Vance blood carried.
Footsteps pounded behind them. Heavy, swift, and closing the gap with terrifying speed.
It wasn't Eleanor’s private guards.
""Clara! Stop running, damn it!"" Damian’s roar cut through the mist. He had shed his suit jacket; his white shirt was soaked, clinging to his chest as he surged forward like an apex predator.
Clara rounded the hedge toward the service gate, only to find the iron gates chained and padlocked. A dead end. The stone walls towered twelve feet high, slick with wet ivy.
Trapped, Clara pressed her back against the wrought iron, her arms shielding Daisy. Her hair was plastered to her face, water dripping down her lashes. ""Stay back, Damian. Call your mother’s dogs. Ruin my life again, but don't touch Daisy. She isn't yours to break.""
Damian skidded to a halt five feet away, chest heaving, his dark hair plastered to his forehead. His gaze shifted from Clara’s terrified face to Daisy’s small, shivering frame. His jaw twitched, and for the first time in Clara's memory, the billionaire’s eyes held genuine agony.
""She’s sick, isn't she?"" Damian said quietly, staring at the faint bluish tint around Daisy’s trembling lips. ""Her breathing... the arrhythmia.""
Clara choked back a sob. ""You know.""
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""It killed my younger brother when he was six,"" Damian whispered, his hand reaching forward, trembling violently. ""My mother told me you terminated the pregnancy.""
Before Clara could answer, a loud click echoed from the terrace balcony above. A sniper’s red laser dot danced across Damian’s chest, then drifted down to settle directly on Clara's heart.
