Chapter 8 - The midnight Trap
DING.
The executive private elevator chime echoed down the vestibule for the second time that night.
My blood ran cold.
Claire’s eyes widened in sheer, unadulterated panic. "He's back! Travis forgot something—he’s coming back up!"
"Lock the safe!" I whispered, shoving the heavy steel door closed and spinning the mechanical dial to re-engage the deadbolts. "Swing the painting back!"
Claire scrambled to push the oil painting back over the wall safe, while I grabbed my utility trash cart, shoved the heavy leather binder beneath a stack of dirty paper towels, and stood near the office doorway, holding my string mop in my gloved hands.
The mahogany double doors swung open violently.
Travis stood in the doorway. He had removed his suit jacket, his silk tie loosened at his throat, his dark hair slightly rumpled. He held his smartphone to his ear, his face contorted in an expression of intense, dark irritation.
"I don't care if the Cayman server is undergoing maintenance, Victor!" Travis snarled into the phone. "Execute the transfer through the Zurich node before midnight!"
He stopped dead in his tracks.
His slate-grey eyes landed on me standing in the center of his office, wearing the oversized navy-blue Apex jumpsuit, holding a damp mop over his Persian rug.
Beside his desk stood Claire, pale, trembling, and leaning against the walnut paneling for support.
Travis slowly lowered his phone from his ear. His expression shifted from irritation to a cold, dangerous fury that filled the entire room.
"What is this?" Travis asked, his voice dropping into a razor-thin baritone.
He took three slow, deliberate steps into the room, his eyes scanning the space—taking in Claire’s ruined makeup, my presence, and the slight slant of the oil painting on the north wall.
"Claire," Travis said softly, his voice dangerously smooth. "Why is my ex-wife in my private office?"
Claire opened her mouth, but no sound came out. Her knees shook so violently she had to hold onto the desk to keep from collapsing.
I stepped forward, placing myself directly between Travis and his assistant. I held my mop firmly in my right hand, looking my ex-husband straight in the eye.
"She didn't invite me, Travis," I said, my voice completely steady, resonant, and devoid of fear. "I was cleaning the floor."
Travis let out a low, mocking laugh, taking another step toward me until he was standing less than three feet away.
"Cleaning the floor?" Travis sneered, his eyes scanning my blue uniform with dark, vicious pleasure. "Look at you, Eliza. Look at what you've become. Emptying my trash cans for twenty dollars an hour while I run a forty-million-dollar empire."
He reached out, his long fingers grasping the yellow Apex security badge hanging from my neck, lifting it up to look at the photo.
"You really thought you could come back into my building and pretend to be a victim?" Travis whispered, leaning down until his face was inches from mine. "You're a pathetic, desperate washed-up housewife. And by tomorrow morning, you're going to be a federal felon."
I didn't flinch. I didn't step back.
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I looked at the man I had loved for twelve years, seeing the hollow, pathetic monster hiding behind his six-thousand-dollar suit.
"I may be wearing a cleaning uniform, Travis," I whispered back, my voice dripping with cold, absolute contempt. "But at least my signature is real."
