Chương 3 - The Woman Who Had Eleven Days
The first anonymous message arrived on Ruby's fourth morning at the estate. It appeared on her phone while Lily was eating sliced strawberries in the breakfast room.
WE KNOW WHERE YOU LIVE. YOU HAVE UNTIL FRIDAY.
Ruby stared at the screen, her stomach dropping. The number was unfamiliar, but the threat wasn't. For months, collection agencies had called while she bathed her mother, cooked soup she couldn't afford, and argued with an insurance company about a treatment that came too late. She had stopped distinguishing between legitimate reminders and attempts to frighten her into finding money she didn't have.
"Ruby?" Lily asked, holding up a strawberry. "Red."
"Very red," Ruby answered, turning her phone facedown.
Her mother had once said that desperation made a person feel like a thief even when she hadn't stolen anything. Ruby finally understood. Every time she walked through the Romano mansion, she became aware of priceless objects she could never imagine buying. A single painting might settle her debts. A vase in the entryway could pay for a year of rent.
She had no intention of touching any of it. But she hated that her own fear made her think about prices at all.
After lunch, she called the medical billing office from the garden. A polite representative confirmed what Ruby already knew: some charges were under review, others remained contested, and one collection firm was pursuing a payment plan that would swallow nearly half her new salary. Ruby requested written documentation and ended the call before the representative could tell her she was being unreasonable.
The argument left her thinking about the last week of her mother's life. Elaine had apologized for needing a wheelchair even when she could barely stand. At the hospital, Ruby had argued with a billing clerk while her mother asked for another blanket. She remembered the shame of having her voice become louder than the person she'd come to care for. Later, Elaine had squeezed her hand and said, "You don't have to win every fight for me. Sit down. Tell me something ordinary."
That was why Ruby kept the blue teapot. It reminded her of mornings when the two of them drank terrible tea and discussed television shows instead of insurance codes. It was also why the stranger's threat felt especially vicious. He wasn't simply asking for money. He was trying to turn the memory of her mother into a handle he could use to steer her. Ruby opened a fresh notebook, wrote the amounts she could verify, and crossed out every demand for which she had no documentation. For the first time, the debt became a problem to examine instead of a monster to obey.
"You could ask for an advance," Marta said that evening when Ruby admitted why she'd been quiet all day.
"From a man I've worked for four days?"
"From an employer who paid for the fountain to be moved because Lily disliked the noise."
"I'm not going to become a charity project."
Marta folded a clean towel. "Then don't. Ask the payroll office about your options. There's a difference between help and charity."
Ruby knew Marta was right. Unfortunately, shame rarely listened to reason.
Vincent noticed her distraction at dinner. Lily wanted Ruby to eat beside her, and the little girl had recently discovered the joy of pushing peas around a plate while announcing the names of animals they resembled. Ruby laughed at the third pea-snake, but her eyes kept returning to the phone beneath her napkin.
"Trouble?" Vincent asked after Marta took Lily for a bath.
"Nothing I can't handle."
"That wasn't quite an answer."
Ruby stiffened. "And that sounded like a question my landlord would ask."
To his credit, Vincent put down his coffee. "Fair enough. I overstepped."
She should have left then. Instead, perhaps because he had apologized without demanding forgiveness, she found herself telling him about her mother.
Elaine Jenkins had been a home health aide for thirty years. When ovarian cancer forced her to stop working, Ruby left a bookkeeping position to care for her. Two years of hospital visits erased their savings. When Elaine died four months earlier, Ruby discovered that grief did not stop bills from arriving. Her employer had downsized. Her landlord wanted back rent. And every job interview seemed to end when she explained the gap in her résumé.
"I applied here at two in the morning," Ruby finished. "I was supposed to be asleep, but someone had left a message saying they were going to take my mother's ring."
Vincent remained silent long enough that she regretted saying anything.
"Why didn't you tell the agency?" he asked at last.
"Because they wanted references, not a tragedy."
"And you thought I'd think less of you?"
"I thought you'd think I was here for your money."
He looked at her steadily. "You are here for a salary. I hope everyone who works for me is."
Ruby laughed despite herself.
"I can put you in touch with our employment attorney," he added. "Not to pay your debts. To make sure the collectors are following the law. You can decline."
"I'd like that," she said after a pause.
He nodded and changed the subject. For the first time in months, someone had learned how desperate she was without treating desperation as a character flaw.
Later that night, Ruby heard music drifting from the closed drawing room. She followed it and found Vincent standing before a piano, pressing one key over and over.
"Did I wake you?" he asked.
"No. I was looking for tea."
"Sophia played. Lily used to fall asleep on her lap while she practiced. I've been trying to remember the first few notes of her favorite song."
Ruby approached the piano but kept her distance. "What did she call it?"
"Home Again. A ridiculous little tune she made up. She never wrote it down."
"Maybe Lily remembers the melody."
"Maybe." Vincent stared at the keys. "I keep thinking about the last thing I said to Sophia. I complained that she was taking too long at the party. I wanted her home because I had a meeting."
"She didn't die because you were impatient," Ruby said.
"I know that intellectually."
"Intellect can be very slow when grief is involved."
He looked up at her. The house suddenly seemed too quiet.
"You speak from experience."
"I told my mother I'd see her after work. Then the hospital called before I could get there. I've spent four months wishing I'd said something better."
They stood together in the glow of the piano lamp, two strangers with different lives and the same unfinished conversation.
The next morning, Ruby received a second message. This one was not from a collection agency. A photograph of her entering the Romano estate filled the screen. Beneath it appeared a single sentence:
A WOMAN IN YOUR POSITION SHOULD THINK VERY CAREFULLY ABOUT WHOM SHE TRUSTS.
May you like
Ruby looked toward the security cameras above the front gate. The image had been taken from outside the property, across the road.
Someone knew about her debts. Someone was watching the house. And somebody wanted her to believe those two facts were connected.
