Chapter 2 - The Woman Who Stayed
Gabriel had spent six months learning how to stand again.
Now one sentence nearly knocked him back into the wheelchair.
“What do you mean it wasn’t an accident?”
Eleanor did not answer immediately.
Her eyes remained fixed on Maya.
Maya’s fingers were still trapped inside Gabriel’s hand.
He could feel them trembling.
Across the ballroom, Adrian moved.
Only half a step.
But Gabriel noticed.
“Don’t,” Gabriel said.
Adrian stopped.
The guests fell silent again.
Vanessa stared between the three of them.
“This is ridiculous.”
Gabriel ignored her.
“Maya.”
She looked at him.
“You were in my car?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Her throat moved as she swallowed.
“In the passenger seat.”
A strange pressure formed behind Gabriel’s eyes.
He searched his memory.
Rain.
A curve in the coastal highway.
A truck’s headlights somewhere behind him.
A scream.
Then blackness.
No Maya.
“How?”
Maya looked around at the watching guests.
“Not here.”
Gabriel’s expression hardened.
“You kept this from me for six months.”
“I know.”
“And now you want privacy?”
Pain crossed her face.
“I’m asking because somebody in this room may have tried to kill you.”
That silenced even Vanessa.
Gabriel stared at Maya.
Adrian laughed suddenly.
It was too loud.
Too casual.
“Oh, come on.”
Gabriel turned.
Adrian spread his hands.
“We’re turning a car crash into some cheap mystery because a maid is embarrassed she was somewhere she shouldn’t have been?”
Maya looked at him.
“You know exactly where I was.”
Adrian’s smile vanished.
Vanessa stepped between them.
“Stop it.”
Maya’s gaze remained fixed on Adrian.
“I saw the headlights.”
Adrian said nothing.
“I saw the car following us.”
Gabriel’s pulse quickened.
“What car?”
Maya closed her eyes.
When she opened them again, something had changed.
She had made a decision.
“A black SUV.”
Adrian shrugged.
“There are millions of black SUVs.”
“It followed us from the hotel.”
Gabriel frowned.
“What hotel?”
Maya looked at him.
“The Harbor Crown.”
A fragment flashed through his memory.
A marble lobby.
A folder.
Maya standing near an elevator.
Gabriel pressed a hand against the back of a chair.
His legs were beginning to weaken.
Maya immediately noticed.
“Sit down.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’ve been standing too long.”
“I said I’m fine.”
His voice came out harsher than intended.
Maya stepped back.
Gabriel saw the hurt on her face.
He hated himself for causing it.
But six months of missing memory had suddenly opened beneath him like a grave.
He needed answers.
Eleanor approached.
“Gabriel, listen to her.”
He sat reluctantly.
Not because he wanted to.
Because his legs had begun shaking.
The wheelchair suddenly felt different.
Minutes earlier it had symbolized everyone’s mistaken judgment of him.
Now it felt like a reminder of how close he had come to dying.
Gabriel looked at Maya.
“Start at the beginning.”
Vanessa interrupted.
“Gabriel, this is insane. She could say anything.”
He slowly turned toward his former fiancée.
“You threw your engagement ring at me ten minutes ago.”
Vanessa stiffened.
“You don’t get a vote anymore.”
A few guests lowered their eyes.
Gabriel looked toward the security team.
“Close the doors.”
Vanessa stared.
“What?”
“Until I understand what happened, nobody leaves.”
Adrian laughed.
“You can’t imprison your guests.”
“No.”
Gabriel looked directly at him.
“But I can ask my security team to preserve every camera recording from tonight while anyone who wishes to leave is escorted out.”
Adrian’s face tightened.
Gabriel had seen that expression before in boardrooms.
It meant Adrian was calculating.
That interested him.
Maya remained beside the wheelchair.
Gabriel looked at her again.
“The Harbor Crown.”
She nodded.
“You had a private meeting there.”
“With whom?”
“I don’t know.”
“You were with me.”
“I was working there that night.”
That surprised him.
“You didn’t work for my family?”
“Not then.”
Maya explained.
Six months earlier she had been part of the evening hospitality staff at the Harbor Crown Hotel.
Gabriel had arrived shortly before midnight for a meeting.
He had been alone.
Or so Maya had believed.
Around twelve thirty, she had seen him leave a private conference room carrying a leather folder.
He appeared angry.
Ten minutes later, while Maya was leaving after her shift, she found Gabriel in the parking garage.
His hand was bleeding.
“What happened?”
“He had punched something,” Maya said.
Gabriel looked at his knuckles instinctively.
A faint scar remained.
He had never remembered how he got it.
“You asked whether I needed a ride,” Maya continued.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because it was raining.”
Gabriel almost smiled.
That sounded like him.
“What happened after that?”
“I told you my bus had stopped running.”
“So you got into the car.”
“Yes.”
“And then?”
Maya glanced at Adrian.
“We were followed.”
Adrian shook his head.
“Convenient.”
Maya ignored him.
“The SUV stayed behind us for several miles. Every time you accelerated, it accelerated.”
Gabriel felt another flash.
Rain hammering the windshield.
A pair of headlights in the mirror.
His hand tightening around the steering wheel.
“Did I notice?”
“Yes.”
“What did I say?”
Maya hesitated.
“You said, ‘They found me.’”
Gabriel stared at her.
“Who?”
“You never told me.”
His breathing slowed.
“What happened before the crash?”
Maya’s eyes filled again.
“The SUV came alongside us.”
Gabriel waited.
“It hit us.”
Several guests gasped.
“Once?”
“Three times.”
Gabriel’s fingers curled around the wheelchair armrest.
“The last impact pushed us toward the barrier.”
Maya’s voice began breaking.
“You tried to correct the wheel. We spun. I remember the guardrail coming toward us.”
She stopped.
Gabriel could hear rain in his head.
Metal screaming.
Maya shouting.
“What happened to you?”
“I woke up outside the car.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were you injured?”
“Concussion. Broken wrist. Cuts.”
Gabriel looked at her hands.
He suddenly remembered seeing an old scar near her wrist.
He had once asked about it.
She had said she fell.
Another lie.
“Why wasn’t your name in the police report?”
Maya looked at Eleanor.
Gabriel followed her gaze.
“Aunt Eleanor?”
Eleanor closed her eyes.
“I removed it.”
Gabriel stared at her.
“You what?”
“I paid someone to keep Maya’s name out of the first press reports.”
“Why?”
“Because she called me from the hospital.”
Maya whispered, “I thought someone would come back.”
Eleanor continued.
“She said the crash had been deliberate.”
Gabriel’s voice dropped.
“And you believed her?”
“I didn’t know.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I was terrified!”
Eleanor’s voice cracked.
“You were in surgery. Doctors didn’t know whether you would live through the night. Maya was twenty-eight years old, injured and hysterical, telling me somebody had tried to kill you. I made a decision.”
Gabriel stared at the woman who had helped raise him.
“You hid a witness.”
“I protected one.”
“From whom?”
Eleanor looked across the ballroom.
“That is what I’ve spent six months trying to discover.”
Vanessa stepped backward.
Gabriel noticed.
“So you knew too?”
Vanessa shook her head.
“No.”
“Vanessa.”
“I swear.”
Adrian placed a hand on her shoulder.
Maya’s expression changed.
She stared at the hand.
Then at Adrian’s cuff.
Her face went white.
“What?” Gabriel asked.
Maya did not answer.
She stepped closer to Adrian.
He immediately pulled his arm back.
Maya pointed.
“Your cuff links.”
Adrian looked down.
Small silver cuff links shaped like wolves.
“So?”
Maya’s breathing became shallow.
“I’ve seen them before.”
Adrian scoffed.
“Lots of men own cuff links.”
“Not those.”
Gabriel looked at Maya.
“Where?”
Her eyes never left Adrian.
“The night of the crash.”
Adrian’s face became perfectly still.
Maya whispered:
“When I woke beside the wreck, someone was standing over me.”
Gabriel’s blood went cold.
“I couldn’t see his face.”
She pointed toward Adrian’s wrist.
“But when he reached down to check whether I was alive, lightning flashed.”
Her voice dropped.
“And I saw a silver wolf on his cuff.”
Adrian smiled.
But this time, Gabriel saw fear beneath it.
“Interesting story.”
Maya shook her head.
“No.”
She stepped closer.
“You made one mistake.”
“What?”
“You thought I was unconscious.”
The ballroom was silent enough to hear the chandeliers hum.
Maya looked directly into Adrian’s eyes.
“I heard what you said.”
Gabriel leaned forward.
“What did he say?”
Maya turned toward him.
“He looked inside the wreck and said, ‘Gabriel should have taken the deal.’”
Adrian’s expression changed.
Just once.
Just enough.
And Gabriel saw it.
May you like
Recognition.
For the first time since the crash, Gabriel knew that his missing memories were not protecting him from an accident—they were protecting him from the identity of the person who had wanted him dead.
