Chapter 3 - Three Twelve in the Morning
The police arrived before the first guests understood why the music had stopped.
Detective Elena Ruiz separated everyone in the foyer while a paramedic checked the red mark around Maisie's ankle.
Sloane kept repeating the same sentence.
"I was trying to keep her safe."
Graham never answered her.
His family attorney, Samuel Pike, arrived twenty minutes later in a wrinkled suit and reading glasses.
He studied the guardianship form, then the intake paperwork.
"These are sophisticated," Sam said quietly. "Not photocopy jobs. Whoever made them had access to your digital signature files."
"Sloane had access to my house."
"And your office?"
"Not officially."
Sam turned his laptop toward him.
The digital authorization packet had been generated at 3:12 a.m. six nights earlier from Graham's home IP address.
Graham had been in Chicago that night.
His flight receipt proved it.
"Who was in your house?" Ruiz asked.
"Sloane. Maisie. Our nanny, June."
June Carter had worked for Graham since Maisie was born. He would have trusted her with his life.
Ruiz looked toward the ballroom. "Trust is not evidence. We verify everyone."
Maisie sat nearby with Ava, holding Clover against her chest.
Graham knelt beside her.
"Did Sloane ever ask you to sign anything?"
Maisie frowned.
"No."
"Did she give you medicine?"
Maisie's eyes lifted.
"The purple drink."
Graham froze.
"What purple drink?"
"She said it was a vitamin because I kept waking up. It made my head sleepy."
Sloane, across the room, suddenly stopped talking to the officer beside her.
Ruiz noticed.
Within an hour, Maisie was at the children's hospital for blood work.
At 4:38 p.m., the pediatrician stepped into the consultation room holding a lab report.
"Mr. Grant, we found a prescription sedative in your daughter's system."
Graham stared at him.
"She has never been prescribed a sedative."
May you like
The doctor nodded grimly.
"That's why I called the police back."
