Chapter 3 - The Green Dress in the Hallway
The faint creak of the white door swinging another inch wider broke the stillness of the nursery. I didn't turn my head away from the crib, but my gaze shifted from the smooth wood of the headboard to the edge of the hallway wall where the green fabric caught the amber glow of the city lights filtering through the tall windows.
She didn't stay in the crack. The blonde woman in the green dress pushed the door open the rest of the way, stepping fully into the threshold of the nursery. Her shoes made a soft, hollow tapping against the hardwood floor—a sharp contrast to the muffled silence we’d maintained since he burst through the front entrance. Her breath hitched slightly before she smoothed the front of her dress down with palms that looked damp in the dim light.
"You can't just lock the doors and pretend the city doesn't exist," she said. Her voice was low, tight with a nervous edge that didn't belong in a room designed for quiet lullabies. "People down there are asking questions. If anyone connects this address to the foundation, or to whatever mess you're hiding up here—"
He didn't turn around immediately. He stood by the floor-to-ceiling glass, his broad shoulders squared inside the tailored black suit, his fingers hooked briefly into the edge of his black tie as if to loosen it, though he didn't pull the knot. Then he turned, his jaw tight, his eyes dark and flat as he looked from her back to me.
"Nobody is connecting anything," he said, his voice dropping into that steady, heavy register that left no room for argument. He took a measured step back toward the center of the room, the faint ambient night sounds from the street far below rising up through the glass. As he moved under the recessed ceiling lights, the collar of his shirt shifted just enough to expose the dense, dark ink of the neck tattoos creeping up toward his jawline—a stark, permanent reminder of a life outside this high-rise sanctuary that he usually kept buried beneath stiff collars and expensive wool.
She stepped further into the room, her eyes darting nervously toward the white baby crib before locking onto him. "You think a suit and a locked gate keep people from talking? They know you were at the docks yesterday. They know something's shifting."
"Let them know," he said, closing the distance between them until he towered over her by half a foot. His authority wasn't loud; it was physical, anchored by the heavy drape of his suit and the deliberate slowness of his movements. He didn't raise his voice, but the space in the room seemed to contract around him. "Let them look wherever they want. But nobody touches this floor. Understand?"
She swallowed hard, her chest rising and falling beneath the green silk of her dress. Her gaze flicked toward me one more time—a mix of warning and exhaustion—before she realized the battle lines were already drawn and she was standing on the wrong side of them.
May you like
Without another word, she turned on her heel, her footsteps quick and sharp as she retreated out of the nursery, navigating the short hallway back toward the main living area. The sound of her departure echoed briefly before the heavy silence reclaimed the apartment, leaving just the heavy, distressed breathing of the man in the black suit as he watched her go, then turned his gaze back to where I stood by the crib.
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