Chapter 10: A Strange Day

We left Waverly twenty minutes later, walking two blocks down the avenue until the glass boutiques gave way to a quiet corner cafe.

Daphne took a booth near the back, dropping Vaughn’s folded paper onto the table. She ordered two coffees, slid one toward me, and leaned back.

"That overgrown toddler," she said, shaking her head. "This isn't an errand run. It's a hazing ritual. It’s no wonder the agency can't keep anyone past ten days."

I pulled the mug closer, letting the heat seep into my fingers. The sweet syrup cut through the taste of adrenaline left over from the showroom.

Daphne tilted her head, studying me. "You're unusual, Freya."

"Unusual?"

"Most people would be in my office crying or threatening a constructive dismissal suit," she said, pointing toward the truck parked outside. "He gives you a list meant to break you, you hunt down the items anyway, and when security corners you over his Centurion card, you quote battery statutes instead of panicking."

"I've worked the late shift at a waterfront bar," I said. "Angry men in uniforms don't scare me. And the coffee is good."

Daphne rested her forearms on the table, her tone dropping into something far more serious.

"Listen to me. Vaughn didn't send you across county lines just to see if you could drive a truck. He’s cornered, and he’s trying to clear the house before the walls cave in."

"What does that mean?"

"The Tritons have an off-day before the road series," Daphne said. "His teammates are descending on Belmont tonight, and word through the front office is that Cleo might show up to stake her claim."

"Cleo?"

"Cleo Vance," Daphne answered, her mouth pulling flat. "The general manager's daughter. She thinks she owns the franchise, and right now, she thinks she owns Vaughn. If she tries to treat you like dirt, do not take the bait."

She leaned closer, tapping the table. "You report to me, not to his social circle. If things get toxic up there, tell me."

I kept quiet for a beat. If Daphne stormed the estate to manage Vaughn, he’d terminate the domestic placement before midnight. That six-thousand-dollar monthly wire would disappear, taking my mother’s oxygen concentrator and Jonah’s tuition with it.

"I can handle him," I said, holding my tone even. "I grew up around angry men in a trailer park, and a bad temper isn't running me off. Just don't step in over basic friction."

Daphne searched my face, waiting for a crack in my composure. When she didn't find one, she let out an exhale.

"Fine," she said. "On one condition: if anyone crosses the line physically, or if Cleo tries to put hands on you, you call me that second. Understood?"

"Understood."

"Put my direct line on your speed dial."

I pulled out my cracked phone, entered her personal number, and assigned it to key two. I turned the screen toward her so she could see it.

"Who is number one?" she asked.

"My brother," I said.

A faint smile touched her mouth. "Good. Keep it that way. Now drink up—you have an estate to survive."

The sun was dropping behind the ridge when I turned the pickup through the front gates of Belmont.

The quiet pines around the driveway were vibrating with low bass booming from the main house.

I steered the truck up the gravel circle. Vernon was standing near the hydrangeas, winding up a green garden hose. He twisted the valve shut as I pulled alongside him, tipping his straw hat back.

I cut the engine, opened the cab door, and stepped out onto the drive, my calves tight from hours on the highway pedals.

"Where should I take the haul?" I asked, wiping road grit from my forehead.

Vernon’s brow furrowed, glancing toward the southern terrace where French doors were rattling to the music.

"Leave the gear in the truck bed until morning, Miss Freya," he said, keeping his voice low. "Pull the pickup into the detached garage and lock the bay door."

"Vaughn wanted every item inside the house before sundown."

"Mr. Mercer has company," Vernon warned. "The Tritons' starting roster arrived three hours ago, and they've already emptied out half the cellar by the pool. When ballplayers drink to drown their heads, you don't cross their path."

I looked at the house, listening to the muffled shouting drifting over the grass. "Should I tell him the run is done, or head straight to the casita?"

Vernon shook his head. "Go to the garage and stay out of sight."

I climbed back into the cab, pulled the truck inside the deep bay, and shut off the ignition. The silence inside the concrete stall rushed in. I leaned back against the headrest for thirty seconds, letting my eyes close against the steering wheel.

Then reality kicked in.

The South Port butcher had packed the forty pounds of pasture-raised short ribs into a heavy, wax-lined cardboard shipping carton, sitting next to two bags of raw artisan cheeses and whole dairy. It was eighty-five degrees out. If that beef sat in the garage overnight, it would spoil before sunrise, and Vaughn would have a textbook excuse to terminate my contract.

"Not happening," I muttered.

I hopped down, rounded the truck, and hauled the meat carton out from the footwell. It weighed nearly fifty pounds with the ice packs, the edges of the waxed cardboard digging straight into my forearms as I hoisted it against my ribs. I hooked the plastic dairy sacks over three fingers of my left hand, kicked the garage side door shut, and hurried along the walkway toward the service entrance.

The moment I stepped inside, the noise hit like a physical wall.

Subwoofers were thumping through the framing, vibrating the picture frames along the corridor. Cigar smoke hung thick in the air, mixed with spilled whiskey. Red cups and crushed cans littered the floorboards, and someone had left a mud-caked cleat right in the middle of the hall.

Hours of scrubbing waiting for me tomorrow.

I kept my head down, hauling the cold cargo against my ribs as my shoulders burned under the weight. All I needed was thirty seconds to shove the beef into the walk-in cooler, drop the dairy on the shelf, and slip away to the casita.

I cleared the final archway into the main kitchen and stopped dead.

The room was overrun.

Half a dozen enormous men were crowded around the island and the double refrigerators. Dressed in cutoff shirts and gym shorts, their arms covered in tattoos, they were yelling back and forth over a portable speaker blasting hip-hop on the counter. Open pizza boxes were stacked three high, tortilla chips lay crushed on the counters, and half-empty tequila bottles blocked the path to the pantry.

My forearms were trembling under the strain of the butcher's box, sweat running down the back of my neck.

The sheer wreckage in front of me, after ten hours of fighting traffic across three zip codes, broke through whatever patience I had left.

"You've got to be shitting me," I muttered aloud.

The track on the speaker cut to an abrupt end at that exact second.

The words carried straight into the silence.

The shouting stopped. Every single player froze, turning toward the archway in unison.

Six professional athletes stood staring across the wreckage, their focus pinned right on my face.