Chapter 5 - THE THRESHOLD OF FEAR
Grant pushed the door open with a single, gentle motion of his hand. Hannah did not try to stop him; she stumbled backward, her knees trembling so violently she had to catch the edge of the laminate table to keep from falling.
Grant stepped across the threshold, his heavy boots crossing the cracked linoleum. The cold in the room hit him like a physical blow—it was colder inside than it was on the street, the draft from the cracked window pane cutting straight through the wool of his coat.
He walked straight to the sofa, kneeling down on the dusty floorboards beside the trembling child.
The little girl had soft, tangled brown curls that clung to her damp, burning forehead. Her small chest rose and fell in rapid, rattling gasps, her tiny lips dry and chapped from fever. She opened her eyes for a fleeting second—huge, liquid hazel eyes that fluttered before rolling back beneath heavy, dark lashes as she whimpered in her sleep.
Grant reached out his broad right hand—the hand covered in dark tattoos—and gently laid the back of his fingers against the little girl’s burning cheek.
The heat radiating from her skin was alarming.
Behind him, Hannah scrambled to the door, peering frantically into the empty, dim hallway outside before slamming the door shut and throwing both deadbolts with shaking hands. She turned around, pressing her back flat against the wood, her chest heaving as if she were being hunted by hounds.
"Please," Hannah gasped, her voice a desperate, pleading sob that broke against the peeling walls. "Please, Mr. Whitaker... please don’t tell Celeste you came here. Please don’t tell her you saw us."
Grant slowly stood up from the floor, his tall frame towering in the small room. He looked at Hannah, his eyes dark, deep, and burning with a terrifying, dangerous clarity.
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"Why would she care?" Grant asked, his voice low, gravelly, and steady. "Why would my fiancée care if I visit an employee whose child is dying of pneumonia?"
Hannah looked from Grant’s face toward the sofa where her daughter lay shivering under the coats, then looked back at him, her eyes wide with an agony so profound it seemed to pull the breath straight from her lungs.
