The silver tray left Emma Carter’s hands one second before the bullet reached the window.

Crystal champagne flutes exploded against the glass wall of Don Romano’s ballroom. Guests screamed as Emma drove her shoulder into the most dangerous man in New York and knocked him behind a marble bar.

The window cracked with a sound like ice splitting across a lake.

Three men in black suits drew their guns.

All three aimed at Emma.

“Don’t move,” Marcus Reed ordered.

Emma lay half across Don Romano’s chest, one palm pressed against the polished floor. He was taller than she had realized, solid beneath the tuxedo, and unnervingly calm for a man who had just been shot at.

His gray eyes settled on her face.

“You have three seconds to explain why you tackled me.”

Emma reached beneath the bar.

Marcus’s finger tightened on the trigger.

She slapped the red security switch Rosa had shown the staff during orientation.

Steel shutters dropped over every exterior window. Magnetic locks struck throughout the mansion in a rapid chain of heavy clicks. The orchestra stopped mid-note.

Two hundred guests were trapped inside Romano House.

“Because someone just fired at you,” Emma said. “And whoever did it knew exactly where you would be standing.”

Don looked toward the fractured glass.

The charity gala had been arranged down to the inch. His place for the midnight toast had appeared on staff diagrams, floral plans, catering instructions, and security schedules.

Too many people had known.

Vincent Romano pushed through the crouching guests. Don’s cousin wore a midnight-blue tuxedo and the irritated expression of a man whose evening had been inconvenienced rather than attacked.

“Marcus, get her away from him.”

Don lifted one hand.

No one touched Emma.

He rose behind the bar and offered her his hand. She ignored it and stood by herself.

“How did you see it?” he asked.

“Reflection in the champagne bucket.”

“The rifle?”

“The scope.” Emma pointed toward the upper west wing. “Third floor. Second window from the staircase.”

Marcus spoke into his cuff microphone. “Team Two, west wing. Move.”

Vincent glanced at Emma’s black uniform, then at the broken glasses scattered across the floor.

“She’s been employed here for twelve days.”

“Thirteen,” Emma said.

His gaze sharpened. “That distinction matters to you?”

“Accuracy usually matters when someone’s trying to kill your cousin.”

Don’s mouth almost moved. It was not a smile, but it was close enough to make Vincent notice.

“The shot came from outside,” Vincent said. “The west wing faces the garden wall.”

Emma shook her head. “The glass bent inward where the tray hit it. The bullet mark bent outward.”

Marcus crossed to the window and studied the white crater in the laminated pane.

“She’s right.”

The room changed.

Guests looked toward the grand staircase. Staff looked toward the service doors. Men who had arrived laughing now watched one another’s hands.

The shooter was not beyond the gates.

The shooter was in the house.

Marcus began dividing the guests into groups. Family members went to the gallery. Donors remained in the ballroom. Catering staff were ordered to place their phones on a linen-covered table while guards photographed identification cards.

An elderly judge protested until Don looked at him.

“Your Honor,” Don said, “someone fired a rifle twenty feet from my daughter. You may leave when Marcus says the road is clear.”

The judge sat down.

Emma scanned the staff table. Twelve phones. Thirteen temporary workers had checked in through the service entrance.

“One is missing,” she said.

Marcus followed her gaze. “What?”

“Catering issued thirteen green wristbands. I counted them when Rosa made me check the dessert station. There are twelve people here.”

Vincent gave her a thin smile. “You count the help for entertainment?”

“I count exits, trays, and unfamiliar faces because that’s how you keep two hundred guests from drinking glass cleaner.”

Don turned to Marcus. “Get the check-in photographs.”

Marcus pulled them up on a tablet. The thirteenth worker had signed in as Aaron Pike with a New Jersey address. His driver’s license scanned clean, but his face did not appear in the catering company’s employee roster.

Emma recognized him anyway.

“He carried the champagne to this side of the room,” she said. “He asked exactly when Mr. Romano would make the toast.”

“And you didn’t report that?” Vincent asked.

“Half the temporary staff asked about timing. Your event manager threatened to dock their pay if one course ran late.”

Don’s eyes remained on the photograph. “He entered as a waiter and moved upstairs before the toast. That means he had a second uniform waiting.”

“Or help,” Marcus said.

The emergency lights flickered once.

Emma looked toward the staff corridor. A green wristband lay on the carpet just inside the door, cut cleanly through the middle.

A small figure appeared on the landing above them.

Grace Romano stood barefoot in a navy dress, clutching a sketchbook to her chest. Her black curls had come loose from their ribbon. She stared at the fractured window, then at her father.

Don’s control broke for the first time.

“Grace, go back to your room.”

The ten-year-old did not move.

Emma had cleaned Grace’s room every morning for nearly two weeks. The child had never spoken to her, but she had begun leaving drawings on the pillow: the greenhouse, the old piano, a woman standing beneath a red umbrella.

Now Grace drew one finger across her throat.

Don went still.

“What does that mean?” Marcus asked.

Emma looked at the girl’s terrified face.

“It means she saw someone.”

Grace’s eyes moved toward the west hallway.

The lights went out.

Someone screamed.

Emma heard shoes strike marble near the staircase. She ran toward the sound before the emergency lamps turned red.

A man in a catering jacket shoved past her.

Emma caught his sleeve. He twisted hard, dragging her into a column. Pain flashed through her shoulder, but she held on long enough to feel something metallic beneath his cuff.

He struck her across the mouth.

Don appeared from the dark and drove the man into the wall.

The caterer tore free, leaving his jacket in Don’s fist. He disappeared through the service corridor as Marcus’s team thundered down the stairs.

“Seal the kitchens,” Don ordered. “No one leaves.”

“They’re already sealed,” Emma said, tasting blood.

His gaze dropped to her split lip.

The temperature in his face seemed to fall.

“Who hit you?”

“The man you just lost.”

“I didn’t lose him.” Don handed the jacket to Marcus. “I gave him one hallway.”

Marcus understood. He directed two guards toward the service elevator and another team toward the cellar stairs.

Vincent stared at Don. “You used the maid to slow him down?”

“The maid slowed him down without being asked.”

Emma wiped blood from her lip. “You’re welcome.”

A sound came from the west corridor.

Not a gunshot.

A child’s sharp inhale.

Grace stood at the end of the hall, frozen beside the discarded catering jacket.

Something had fallen from its inner pocket.

Emma reached it first.

It was a round brass badge, dark with age, stamped with the crest of Romano Fleet Services. Most of the lettering had worn away, but the name scratched across the back remained clear.

B. CARTER.

Emma stopped breathing.

Don saw the name over her shoulder.

His hand closed around her wrist before she could hide the badge.

“Who is B. Carter?” Marcus asked.

Don did not look at him.

He looked only at Emma.

“Her brother,” he said.

Emma’s pulse kicked against his fingers.

No one at Romano House was supposed to know about Ben.

No one except the person who had made him disappear.

“How do you know that?” she whispered.

Don Romano released her wrist.

“Because your brother killed my wife.”