Chapter 6 - The Ultimatum at Midnight
By 11:00 PM, Iris had packed her single duffel bag.
She stood in her small room in the servants’ quarters, looking around the Spartan space. The photograph of Maya was safely tucked inside her coat pocket. The forty-seven dollars in tips remained in her purse. Outside, the rain was pounding against the window glass with increasing fury.
She was back where she started: jobless, broke, and hunted by loan sharks who wanted forty-eight thousand dollars by next week.
Yet as she hoisted her duffel bag over her shoulder and stepped out into the hallway, she felt a strange, hollow sort of peace. She had tried. She had reached out to a broken child when no one else dared to.
As she neared the service exit, a heavy hand gripped her shoulder, spinning her around.
It wasn't an enforcer. It was Mrs. Croft.
The estate manager looked exhausted, her hair slightly disheveled, holding a thick manila envelope in her hand.
“You’re leaving,” Mrs. Croft stated, looking at the duffel bag.
“Mr. Castellano fired me,” Iris replied evenly. “I’m assuming my exit papers are in that envelope?”
“Your exit papers are in here,” Mrs. Croft said, opening the manila envelope and pulling out a certified bank check. “Along with a severance package equivalent to six months of full administrative salary.”
Iris stared at the check. The amount written on the line was twenty-five thousand dollars.
“I didn't earn this,” Iris said, shaking her head and pushing the envelope back. “I was here for less than two weeks. I broke the rules.”
“Take it, Iris,” Mrs. Croft urged, pressing the envelope firmly into Iris’s hands. “You owe forty-eight thousand to men who break bones for a living, don't you? Master Victor knows about your debt. He ran a full background check on you the moment you stepped through those gates.”
Iris froze. “He... he knows?”
“He knows everything,” Mrs. Croft said grimly. “He knows about your husband abandoning you, about Maya’s medical bills, about the loan sharks hounding you every night. And despite all of that, he fired you because he was terrified of what was happening between you and his son.”
“Terrified?” Iris echoed, bewildered.
“Master Victor believes that anyone who gets close to his family ends up destroyed,” Mrs. Croft explained softly. “Audrey died because her heart gave out under the stress of this life. He thinks if Leo attaches himself to you, you’ll be targeted by his enemies, or you’ll leave just like everyone else. He pushed you away to protect you—and to protect Leo.”
Before Iris could process the revelation, the front security intercom buzzed loudly through the service station.
Mrs. Croft frowned, walking over to the master console. She flipped the audio switch.
A harsh, grating voice crackled through the speaker—distorted by a burner phone relay.
May you like
“Message for Victor Castellano. Tell the big boss his little housekeeping employee—Iris Day—is currently carrying a very interesting debt. If he wants her to leave the estate alive tonight, he’ll leave fifty thousand dollars in cash at the south perimeter maintenance gate by 1:00 AM. Otherwise... accidents happen on rainy nights in Chicago.”
Mrs. Croft’s face turned chalk-white. “They found you.”
