“And that door has been closed for exactly three years.”

A distinct chill ran down Maya’s spine. She didn’t know it yet, but behind that locked door was the very reason every maid before her had quit in frustration or fear.

When Arthur Penhaligon later pretended to be asleep to test her honesty, he fully expected her to steal, snoop, or run like the others. Instead, Maya did something no one had done in that house for three years—something so unexpected that it made the most powerful man in the city open his eyes and forget how to breathe.

By noon, Maya understood why the mansion felt less like a home and more like a museum built around an open, festering wound. Everything inside was expensive, silent, and strangely untouched: floors that shone like dark water, chandeliers that glittered even when switched off.

White orchids stood in glass vases along the corridors, arranged so perfectly they looked artificial. But there were no family photographs anywhere.

No laughter from a television. No shoes abandoned near a sofa. No smell of warm breakfast lingering from the kitchen. Only order—perfect, polished, and completely unbearable.