Chapter 47
Chapter 47
Chloe’s POV
I ran along the route Zoe had told me, circled around the flower bed, and found the side gate to Voss Manor.
Using the method Zoe had taught me, I unlocked it. The side gate opened, and I slipped inside, then gently closed it behind me.
In the yard, I could hear the butler’s voice coming from the direction of the front entrance. Even from here, I could hear the panic in his tone as he reported the situation to Kael. I made my footsteps as light as possible, kept close to the edge of the flower bed, moved farther in, passed the side of the main building, and found the window on the side of the children’s room.
The window was left slightly open—I had deliberately left it that way before I came out, exactly for this moment.
I pushed the window open and climbed in. I bent my knees when I landed, making no sound.
The lights in the room were off. I quietly shut the window again, walked to the bed, took off my shoes, climbed in, pulled the covers up, and regulated my breathing until it sounded even.
Outside, I heard Kael’s voice. The urgency in it was real. “Keep looking. If she’s not in the manor, expand the search outside. Hurry!”
I listened to that from under the blanket and curled my hand into a fist.
I was thinking: if I just walked out of the room and said I’d been sleeping the whole time, the butler would say they had already searched the room and hadn’t seen me. That wouldn’t make sense.
I needed an explanation—and before Kael came searching in here, I needed them to “discover” me first.
I threw off the blanket again, sat up, put my shoes back on, and went to the window. I opened it a crack and looked out into the yard.
Several house staff were searching the garden with flashlights. All the lights near the front entrance were on, and Voss Manor was brilliantly lit from end to end.
My eyes landed on a large flat stone not far from the front entrance, and in that moment, the idea became perfectly clear in my mind.
I climbed out the window and went over to the stone. I crouched down low and lay flat against the cold rock, pressing my whole body down as much as possible so the thick vines could hide me.
The surface of the stone was a little rough. I could feel it even through my dress. I slowed my breathing and pricked up my ears, listening to the sounds near the front entrance.
All the yard lights were on, and beams from the flashlights swept back and forth over the garden. The footsteps of the house staff came near and then far again. I sorted out each sound one by one—the butler was closest to the front entrance, two staff members were near the flower beds, and another was circling the outer wall of the main building.
I had already timed it in my head. When the footsteps reached the front threshold, I opened my mouth and murmured the two words in the lightest, sleepiest, most dazed voice I could make.
“Daddy... Daddy, save me...”
The footsteps stopped.
I held my breath inside and didn’t move at all, letting the vines cover me.
Then I heard quick footsteps rushing this way, grass crushed underfoot, the speed full of real urgency—he heard me. He was running over.
I kept my eyelids lowered and let my body go limp in the way someone sleeping would, and waited.
Kael reached my side, bent down, and gathered me up from the stone. The movement was steady, but I could feel the tension in his arms—the kind of tension that came from prolonged fear finally easing after finding someone.
“Zoe, Zoe.” He called twice. There was something in his voice I hadn’t expected—real concern, too genuine to hide in time.
I slowly opened my eyes, raised a hand to rub them as if I’d just been woken from sleep, then wrapped both arms around his neck and made my voice soft and sleepy.
“Daddy, you’re back?”
He nodded and adjusted me more securely in his arms. “Mm. Why did you fall asleep outside?”
I had already prepared the next line in my head, and I delivered it in the tone of someone just awakened and feeling a little wronged. “I wanted to sit here and wait for you, but while I was waiting, I fell asleep. Daddy, are you mad?”
I felt his arms tighten slightly. It wasn’t anger. It was guilt.
“It’s okay. I’m not mad,” he said, his voice gentler now. “But Zoe, you’re not healthy enough to wait outside like this anymore.” He paused. “Of course, I’ll also try to come home earlier to spend time with you.”
I broke into the most genuine smile I could make, hugged his neck tighter, and lightly kissed his cheek.
“Daddy’s so nice. Daddy is the best daddy,” I said sweetly, then added with the kind of worry that sounded accidental, “I thought you might hit me like Mommy does.”
I felt his body stiffen ever so slightly.
It was faint, but I felt it.
He carried me toward the living room with the butler following beside us. After a few steps, he asked casually, in the tone of someone sounding offhand while actually asking seriously, “When I’m not home and Iris is taking care of Zoe, does she hit her?”
The butler paused. That pause told me he was weighing it in his mind. Then he spoke, listing the things he knew one by one—Iris scolding Zoe, not letting her eat, hitting her if she failed to meet expectations. Each sentence was restrained, but each landed clearly.
Curled in Kael’s arms, I listened to it all and worked hard to keep my expression from changing at all.
The things Iris had done to Zoe were finally being spoken aloud tonight through the butler’s mouth, and Kael’s expression grew darker and darker.
I buried my face back in his shoulder and gently closed my eyes.
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Later, Ethan texted me and told me how dangerous things had been on his side.
He pulled up the home security playback: when Mom rushed home, the security guards and house staff were all searching outside in the yard. When Marnie told her everyone was focused on searching outside, Mom immediately ordered them coldly to search the house inside and out first.
When Mom pushed open the children’s bedroom door and saw Ethan and me fast asleep buried in a pile of toys, the security footage showed her leaning against the doorframe and letting out a long breath of relief.
Ethan said Marnie and the guards had looked like they’d seen a ghost—they simply couldn’t figure out when we had managed to slip back into our room.
Late that night, lying in bed, I took out my phone, opened the group chat for the three of us, and sent a message.
Chloe: [Mission accomplished!]
Not long after, Ethan replied.
Ethan: [This side’s taken care of too. Good night!]
I laid my phone face-down on my chest and stared at the ceiling. The image of Mom getting slapped tonight was still pressing down somewhere inside me. It hadn’t gone away.
I slowly let out a breath and closed my eyes.
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