Drink the tea, Julian, you look exhausted after the campaign rally, my father-in-law, Senator Arthur Montgomery, said softly as he patted my shoulder.
My hands tightened on Martha’s frail shoulders, the silk of her uniform cool beneath my fingers. Lily stood clutching my leg, her small body trembling against mine.
“Who else knows about Lily?” I demanded, my voice a low rumble she barely heard over her own ragged breathing.
Martha shook her head, tears streaming down her age-lined face. “No one, Mr. Brooks. Not like this. Not for years. Only the Senator, and me.”
Her gaze darted to Lily, then to the half-empty teacup still steaming faintly on the mahogany desk. A shiver ran through me, a chilling understanding.
“He brought her here today,” Martha whispered, the words barely audible. “Not because he missed her, not to see her. He brought her here as a decoy. For you.”
A decoy. The word twisted in my gut. Montgomery hadn’t brought his granddaughter to protect her, but to use her as bait, a distraction, something to make me hesitate if his poison failed.
My vision sharpened, the room’s elegant details blurring into a menacing background. “The tea leaves,” I pressed, my voice flat. “Where did they come from?”
Martha wrung her hands. “Mr. Webb, the junior press secretary. He delivered a box of ‘special campaign tea’ this afternoon. From the Senator, he said. Just a routine executive delivery.”
Marcus Webb. Naive, eager Marcus, always trying to impress Senator Montgomery. He had been the unwitting hand of my attempted murder. The thought made my skin crawl.
Before I could dissect this new, horrifying detail, the heavy oak door creaked open.
“Julian? Martha?”
Marcus Webb stood framed in the doorway, a stack of brightly colored printouts in his hand. His tie was slightly askew, his smile wide and innocent.
“Emergency polling numbers just came in,” he announced, completely oblivious to the seven-year-old girl hidden behind me, the deadly tea on the desk, or the silent horror that had just unfolded in the Senator’s private study.
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