"Ladies and gentlemen, I apologize for the disruption. An unauthorized individual somehow gained access to the VIP section. Security is handling it. Please enjoy your evening."
A murmur rippled through the crowd. Some people looked away; some watched. A few reached for their phones, but thought better of it. No one stood up. No one objected. Three hundred people in a room, and not one of them said a word.
Camille was being walked toward the main entrance. The taller guard had one hand on her shoulder; the shorter one walked behind. Preston followed, hands in his pockets, whistling softly. Sloan kept recording. Victoria returned to her seat and picked up her champagne as if nothing had happened.
Nina Cole watched from the service station. Her hands gripped the towel she had used to wipe Camille's face. Her eyes were red. She wanted to scream. She wanted to run across the ballroom and tell everyone what she had seen. But she was twenty-two, making $14 an hour, and she needed this job to pay for school. So, she stood still, and she hated herself for it.
Camille's heels clicked against the marble as she was walked through the ballroom. The distance from the CEO's table to the main entrance was perhaps sixty feet; it felt like a mile. She could feel every pair of eyes. She could hear the whispers. She could feel the frosting drying on her skin, stiffening her hair, making her face itch. The cut on her forehead throbbed with each heartbeat.
She kept her head up. She didn't look down. She didn't look at Preston whistling behind her. She looked straight ahead at the tall double doors of the main entrance, and she walked: forty feet, thirty feet, twenty.
The guards reached the doors. The taller one placed his hand on the brass handle and pushed it open. The night air rushed in—cool, clean, carrying the scent of jasmine from the courtyard garden—ten feet.
And then the door opened wider: not from the guard's push, but from the other side.
Raymond Fletcher stepped through.
He was still wearing his suit from the board meeting. His tie was loosened. His briefcase was in his left hand. He looked tired—the kind of tired that comes from four hours of arguing with lawyers about compliance regulations. He looked like a man who wanted nothing more than to find his daughter, have a glass of wine, and enjoy the rest of the evening.
What he saw stopped him in his tracks.
Camille. His Camille, standing between two security guards. Her hair matted with dried frosting. Her black dress stained white and brown. A cut on her forehead scabbed with dried blood. Her earring missing. Her hands trembling at her sides. And behind her, a man in a tuxedo, hands in his pockets, whistling.
Raymond's briefcase hit the marble floor. The sound echoed through the entrance hall like a gunshot.