Chapter 2 - The Housekeeper’s Secret
The bedroom door pushed open wider, and Nora rushed in, breathless, her face flushed with panic and exhaustion. She wore a simple gray oversized sweater and sweatpants, her hair pulled back in a hasty clip.
"Mr. Mercer! I am so, so sorry," Nora gasped, her hands flying to her mouth as she saw her daughter sitting comfortably on the billionaire's bed. "Lucy, I told you—you cannot leave the room when the house is dark! Mr. Mercer, please, I'll take her right now—"
Nora reached out, her fingers trembling as she tried to pull Lucy off the bed. She looked terrified, not just of Julian’s legendary coldness, but of losing the job that paid for her daughter’s pediatric asthma medication.
"Wait," Julian said. His voice wasn't loud, but it carried the absolute weight of command.
Nora froze mid-motion, her eyes wide with fear. "Sir?"
"She's fine," Julian said, his gaze fixed on the floral pattern of the duvet. He swallowed hard, trying to regain control of his vocal cords. "She wasn't... she wasn't bothering me."
Nora stared at him, bewildered. In the three months she had worked at the estate, Julian Mercer had barely spoken three words to her. He communicated almost exclusively through sticky notes left on the kitchen island regarding grocery orders. To see him sitting here, listening to a five-year-old talk about bears and turtles at two in the morning, was like watching a statue come to life.
"Go back to sleep, sweetie," Nora whispered to Lucy, her voice cracking with maternal stress as she scooped the little girl into her arms. "We're going back to our room now."
"Wait, Nora," Julian said, standing up from the bed. His legs felt stiff, unaccustomed to sudden movement. "What did Benjamin's turtle say?" he asked Lucy, ignoring the housekeeper's confusion.
Lucy buried her face into Nora’s shoulder, clutching her one-eared rabbit, but she peeked out with one large brown eye.
"The turtle said that love isn't a picture you have to stare at all day so you don't forget it," Lucy murmured sleepily, her eyelids drooping. "Love is the house you live in. Even when you close your eyes to sleep, the house is still holding you."
Nora looked between her daughter and her employer, completely lost. "Mr. Mercer, I don't know what stories she's making up—she has an overactive imagination—"
"No," Julian interrupted, his voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "No, she doesn't."
He turned away, walking toward the massive floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over the sprawling, manicured lawn slick with rain. Outside, the night was a wall of impenetrable black, broken only by the harsh amber glare of security floodlights.
For three years, Julian had believed that his grief was a monument he had to guard every second of the day. If he stopped crying, the monument would crumble. If he stopped torturing himself with memories of the crash, Grace and Caroline would truly die.
Love is the house you live in.
Grace hadn't been a fragile photograph locked in a drawer; she had been the very foundation of his life. She wouldn't have wanted him to burn himself alive on the altar of her memory. She had loved his warmth, his laughter, the way he used to play piano on Sunday mornings—things that had been dead inside him for 1,087 nights.
"Nora," Julian said without turning around.
"Yes, Mr. Mercer?" she answered cautiously.
"Thank you... for bringing her in."
Nora blinked, stunned. "Of course, sir. I'll make sure she doesn't do it again."
"No," Julian said, turning back to face them. Something subtle, yet profound, had shifted behind his hollow eyes. The manic tension in his shoulders had loosened, just a fraction. "Let her stay. Or... actually, tomorrow, bring her into the solarium. We can have breakfast together."
Nora stared at him, searching his face for sarcasm or coldness, finding only a raw, haunting vulnerability. Slowly, a tentative, understanding nod passed between them.
"Goodnight, Mr. Mercer," Nora whispered, carrying the drowsy child out of the room and clicking the door shut behind her.
Julian stood alone in the brilliant, humming silence of his master suite. For the first time in three years, he reached for the wall switch by his bed.
His hand hovered over the dimmer.
With a deep, shuddering breath that felt like his first in a millennium, Julian slid the switch down. The blinding chandeliers clicked off. The wall sconces died.
May you like
The room plunged into darkness.
Julian didn't flinch. He walked slowly, blindly, back to his bed, slipped beneath the heavy silk sheets, and closed his eyes.
