I thought I was going to actually make it to my father’s office unscathed until I rounded the final corner to his wing of the house. One of his security team was standing guard at the door and I could hear my father talking angrily on the phone from inside the room. I ducked behind the corner before I was seen.
Think fast, I thought.
I saw a cleaning woman heading for the stairs and formed a quick, slightly crazy idea.
“Hey!” I said, rushing up to her. “Do you know who I am?”
The woman looked me up and down, face scrunched up. “No? Are you the new girl? You can’t let yourself get so filthy. If Mr. Coleton sees-”
“Yes, that’s me,” I said quickly. But I just found the security guard in Juliette Coleton’s room passed out in the bathroom. Her toilet is overflowing and Juliette’s window is open. I think I saw her trying to climb down the side of the house.”
“Oh my Lord,” the woman said.
“Should we tell Mr. Coleton?” I asked, trying to look like I was in a panic. “Am I going to get fired?”
“Go clean yourself up before he sees you. I’ll tell him.”
I nodded, then stepped into a closet as soon as she was out of sight. I heard her speaking in hurried tones to the security guard outside my father’s room, then to my father. There was some loud cursing, then a stampede of footsteps away from my father’s office and toward my room. I counted to five, then rushed out of the closet and toward my father’s office.
I tried the door and found it was locked. Damn it. I pulled out the keychain I’d lifted from the security guy and went through key after key. There were over a dozen, and I fully expected the correct key would be the last one I tried. But the third worked, and I rushed into the office, spotted my father’s laptop, and grabbed it. I pulled open a few drawers in his desk until I found his notepad where he kept all his passwords. I flipped through it to confirm and saw a note with his laptop password.
Relief washed over me. I did it.
Except I hadn’t exactly thought through how I was going to get out of the house once I found the thing.
I was in the middle of considering a very stupid attempt to climb out the window and jump in a particularly bushy bush when my mother came in behind me.
“Juliette? What on Earth are you doing? I heard you had escaped out of your window? You know you’re not—Is that your father’s laptop?”
“Mom,” I said as carefully as I could. “I know you’ve always tried to help me. I know father doesn’t let you do much. But I could really, really use a little help right now.”
I expected her to pull out her phone and call my father, but she glanced down the hallway the way she’d come, then walked in and closed the door. “What do you need, sweetie?”
40
Juliette
I could still hardly believe my own mother had sprung me from Coleton prison. She’d had a driver bring her a personal car and claimed she had a private affair to handle. She’d stashed me in closets and spare rooms as we progressively worked our way through the house and toward the front door. And she’d whisked me into a car, which was certainly going to be visible on the security cameras later.
I knew how much she was putting on the line for me, and I knew she did, too.
“Thank you so much, Mom,” I said, squeezing her in a hug when she pulled up outside me and Adrian’s apartment.
“I just wish I’d done something sooner,” she said, smiling sadly. “When you left, I spent a lot of time thinking about how many ways I went wrong. Before, it felt like the way it had to be. I was afraid if I helped you, I’d get you cut off from your father’s money and you wouldn’t know what to do. But you never needed it, did you?” She ran her thumb across my cheek. “You went out there on your own and you kicked rear end, Juliette. I was so proud when I heard what you’d been doing.”
I hugged her again. “Thank you. Are you going to be okay when he finds out what you did?”
“I know it doesn’t always seem like it, but I can handle myself. Don’t worry about me. Just do whatever it is you’re trying to do.”
I thanked my mom again and went up to our apartment.
I couldn’t call Adrian to warn him I was coming because my father had taken my phone. So when I knocked on the door, he swung it open and immediately pulled me into a bear hug. “Thank God,” he said, kissing my neck.