Chapter 6- When the world stood still
1486 Words
The mansion was silent on this evening. Too quiet.
Amber was cleaning the marble counter very slowly, her wounded leg still bandaged, her movements were very careful but steady. It had been a tense day all day long, Caroline taking the recipe book out of her hand, Edith refusing to listen to her, the other maids giggling and whispering at her back.
Still, she worked.
Still, she breathed.
Still, she hoped.
The refrigerator was running softly and as Amber put the final bowl in place, the kitchen was full of the humming sound of the machine. She could still smell the chicken that she had cooked before. She massaged the back of her neck, shook her breath, and said:
"Another day done... I guess."
She didn't hear him enter.
Richard was leaning by the door of the kitchen, his suit jacket unbuttoned, his white shirt turned up to his elbows, staring at her with something more serious... more grave... more solemn, than admiration.
He'd had a long day at work. Meetings, pressure, arguments. However, when he looked at her standing there, with soft light on her face, hair falling on her cheek, all the tension had gone out of him.
He did not know when he began falling.
It just... happened.
Amber glanced about in startlement.
"Oh! Mr. Cooper.. I had no idea you had come here.
I have been here, he said to himself, and came nearer. "For a while."
Her breath hitched. His voice was deep, intimate, and dangerous in a manner that caused her to lose strength in her knees.
You ought to be sleeping, he thought. "Your leg.."
"I'm fine," she whispered. "I need to work. I have school fees to pay yet..and my mom..
He drew nearer and his eyes grew tender when her mother was mentioned.
"I know," he said. The reason I do not need to drag it all myself.
Amber gritted his teeth and turned his head. "I'm used to it."
A silence followed between them.. half a moment, but it was not vacuity. It pulsed like a heartbeat.
Richard touched her tenderly, and his fingers stroked a line of flour on her face. Amber stood still, her lips gaping in disbelief.
It was his lingering thumb that said, Flour.
Her cheeks burned.
That, disgraceful, I said to myself, turning her back.
"Not to me."
He uttered this in a manner that made the world tilt. When Amber ventured to look at him once more, he looked different. Darker. Warmer. Something he could not have named, Full of something.
"Amber..." he breathed.
And something in her breast burst open.
She didn't step away.
Richard intruded into her privacy, near enough to feel a portion of his warmth, near enough, in fact, to make her heart ache against her ribs.
His fingers slid to her waist.
"Tell me to stop," he whispered.
She didn't.
She instead breathed in shudders, her body bent down toward his. Her voice was tender and weak:
"I don't want you to."
His breath caught.
Richard picked her up.. hands clenched round her waist, in one breathless moment, and laid her in the cold marble counter. Amber made a little gasp, and he unconsciously caught his shoulders to support himself.
Their countenances were made of one piece.
Her breath brushed his lips.
His fingers traced her cheek.
Each second was an eternity that was about to occur.
"Amber..." again he said, with a broken voice.
She didn't let him finish.
Amber put her hand on him, and her fingers hooked into his shirt, and yanked it down, removing his shirt, and then their lips met.
The kiss was slow at first. Soft. Searching. As two individuals attempting to nurse into memory the moment when it became extinct.
Then it deepened.
The back of her neck was in his hand, his other at her waist. Amber felt her heart racing to a point when she could not hear any more. Richard kissed as a man who had been waiting years to do so, mild and voracious, circumspect and incapable of withdrawing.
The fingers of Amber shook against his breast. His breath grew heavier.
His hand lost grip of her waist, and was drifting down to the hem of her dress, grabbed her thighs, and felt something wet in between her legs, and moaned in a low tone as he was about to reach out for her panties…
--and then--
There was a little voice in the passage.
"Daddy...?"
They froze.
Richard at once withdrew, smoothing his shirt. Amber choked, her countenance all a-glow, her lips a little puffy. She slipped down off the counter with almost as little grace as she attempted to get her composure.
Edith came to the door, rubbing her eyes, with her hair dishevelled with sleep.
She didn't see anything.
But she grimaced at Amber and looked at her face.
You are red, Edith said to herself drowsily. "Are you sick?"
Amber touched her cheek and fled. "No.. I'm fine, sweetheart. Just... tired."
Richard involuntarily stood in the way of Amber.
"What do you need, pumpkin?"
"Water," Edith mumbled.
He took her down the house muttering to hush her up. Amber stood motionless in the kitchen, and her heart was pounding like a drum.
Richard did not talk at once when he came back. He just stood still, breathing heavily, stroking his hair like a man who did not know whether he had just done something wrong... or he had found something he could not leave.
"Amber," he began softly.
She shook her head. "Please don't… I... I don't know what came over me."
He stepped closer, voice low.
"I do."
Her breath caught.
But before he could continue..
In the corridor, there was a girlish giggle.
Then another.
Amber immediately knew who was whispering.. two housemaids and Edith.
Three of them stole a glimpse around the corner.
The jealousy, the suspicion, something darker was twisted on their faces.
Amber felt her stomach drop.
Something was wrong.
THE PLAN
Amber later that night was packing to leave when Edith and the two maids got behind the kitchen.
She is stealing Daddy out of Mommy, Edith whispers in anger.
One maid smirked. "We'll teach her a lesson."
The other said, and see that she loses her job.
They turned their eyes towards the gas knobs.
Turn it a little, the first maid said to herself. And when she later lights the stove it will blow, it will blow only enough to frighten her... perhaps burn her... and then everyone will think it was her fault.
Edith hesitated.
"Will she get hurt?"
"A little," the maid shrugged. But your daddy will take care of you. He will never allow her to approach him again.
Edith nodded, her little face turned up hatefully.
"Okay."
They turned on the gas.
And walked away.
THE EXPLOSION
Amber came into the kitchen to make one final clean-up. She reached for the lighter.
Click.
There was something strange about the smell.
Click.
"Why does it smell..”
BOOM.
This explosion catapulted her. Flames flashed. As she screamed, heat burned her leg. Pots clattered. Glass shattered. Smoke filled the room.
Then.. darkness.
RICHARD'S PANIC
Richard received a call in his office.
Sir.. the kitchen… Amber… explosion..
He didn't hear the rest.
In the meeting he was with some important board members He took up his keys and raced out of the place and drove like a madman, not stopping at any red light till he reached the hospital.
He didn't go home.
He didn't call Caroline.
He went straight to Amber.
She was on the bed, with an oxygen tube in her nose, a leg bandaged, and her face was pale.
The heart of Richard aches like glass.
He spent the night beside her, and held her hand whispering:
"I'm here... I'm not leaving you... I swear I'll find who did this."
Silently dropped the tears he had not known he could cry.
THE TRUTH
The following morning Richard arrived at home.
He didn't speak to anyone.
He didn't touch his coffee.
He immediately ran to his personal study, opened his laptop, and accessed the feeds of the hidden cameras installed in strategic places in his home.
He was watching the footage gradually.
At first calmly.
Then furiously.
Then heartbreakingly.
He saw everything.
Edith.
The maids.
The switch of the gas.
The giggling.
The lies.
His eyes burned.
His hands shook.
By the close of the video, Richard Cooper billionaire, quiet businessman, composed dad was shaking with anger.
He stood up.
Walked to the living room.
And with a voice cold like freezing blood, he said:
"ALL OF YOU… DOWNSTAIRS. NOW."
The maids flinched.
Edith swallowed.
Caroline walked out of her room confused.
"What's going on, Richard?"
He didn't even look at her.
You will all know, you will know, said he darkly. "Right now."
And the entire mansion froze.
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