Chapter 5 - Nightmares and Locked Doors
That night, the storm hit.
Wind howled through the sprawling Connecticut woods, slamming sleet against the third-floor windows with the force of thrown gravel. The electricity flickered twice around midnight, plunging the mansion into brief, terrifying pools of absolute darkness before the emergency generators hummed to life with a low, vibrating groan.
I wasn't sleeping.
I was sitting cross-legged on my bed, reading a worn paperback copy of a nursing manual by the light of a single bedside lamp, when I heard it.
It wasn't the wind.
It was a soft, muffled sound coming from down the hall—the sound of someone trying very hard not to cry.
I laid the book down, slipped my feet into my boots, and stepped out into the dark hallway. The house at night felt entirely different than it did during the day. The vast, empty corridors seemed to stretch endlessly, the family portraits on the walls watching me with cold, aristocratic eyes.
The sound was coming from Luke’s room—the youngest, six years old, whose bedroom was located at the very end of the east wing, right next to a private staircase leading down to the study.
The door was cracked open an inch.
I pushed it open silently.
Luke was curled into a tiny ball in the center of a massive four-poster bed, clutching his stuffed rabbit so tightly his knuckles were white. His small body was wracked with silent sobs, his breath coming in ragged, terrified gasps.
Before I could cross the room, another shadow detached itself from the darkness near the window.
Adrian.
He was wearing a black cashmere sweater and dark trousers, looking exhausted, the gray at his temples stark under the faint moonlight. He was sitting on the edge of Luke’s mattress, one large hand resting awkwardly on the boy’s small shoulder, as if he wanted to pull his son into his arms but was terrified he didn't know how.
"It’s just a storm, Luke," Adrian was saying, his voice rough, stripped of all its corporate steel. "The generators are running. The house is secure."
"The window... it sounded like the glass broke," Luke sobbed, his voice small and broken. "Like the night... like when Mommy..."
Adrian’s hand froze on the boy’s shoulder. The air in the room suddenly turned absolute zero.
I stepped into the light of the bedside lamp. "Luke."
The boy’s head snapped up, his tear-streaked face illuminated by the yellow glow. Adrian turned sharply, his eyes flashing with defensive irritation at being caught in a moment of vulnerability.
"Miss Carter," Adrian hissed, standing up quickly. "This is a private family—"
"Shut up, Adrian," I said quietly, walking past him without a second glance.
Adrian stared at me in stunned disbelief. Nobody told Adrian Vale to shut up in his own house, let alone a twenty-four-year-old nanny he had hired four days ago.
I sat down on the edge of the mattress right where Adrian had been sitting, ignoring the billionaire towering over me. I pulled Luke gently into my lap, wrapping my arms around his small, trembling frame, and resting my chin on top of his messy brown hair.
"Hey, buddy," I whispered, rocking him slowly back and forth. "Bad dreams?"
Luke buried his face in my neck, crying harder now that he had permission to let go. "The wind... it sounds like the night of the accident. Daddy tried to fix it, but he can't make the noise stop."
"Of course he can't," I said softly, glancing up at Adrian, whose face was pale, carved out of stone and bitter regret. "Because your dad is good at a lot of things—like building empires and dodging bullets and intimidating politicians—but weather control? That’s way above his pay grade."
A tiny, choked hiccup escaped Luke’s throat. He pulled back slightly, looking up at me through his tears. "W-weather control?"
"Totally," I said, wiping a tear from his cheek with my thumb. "Only superheroes and weather witches can control thunderstorms. And since your dad refuses to wear a cape—trust me, I’ve asked—we’re just going to have to deal with the noise ourselves."
Luke let out a watery giggle.
I looked up at Adrian, who was standing beside the bed like a ghost caught between two worlds. "Well? Are you just going to stand there looking decorative, Mr. Vale, or are you going to help me build a blanket fort?"
Adrian blinked. "A... a blanket fort?"
"Unless you have a better idea for keeping the monsters out," I said evenly. "Grab those extra duvets from the closet. The red ones. If we’re going to survive the storm, we need a fortress."
May you like
For three seconds, I thought he was going to fire me on the spot. I thought his pride, his rigid control, his untouchable billionaire armor would win out.
Instead, Adrian Vale—the kingpin of Greenwich, the man feared by corporate boards and underworld syndicates alike—turned around, opened the closet door, pulled out two heavy red goose-down duvets, and knelt on the floor beside us to help build a fort.
