Three seconds before my master’s wedding, I told him about his death, but when his bride looked at the phone left in my hand, she stopped

Three seconds remained until Griffin Hales’s wedding when I left a silver tray on someone else’s table and crossed the hall as if I were running for my life.

I was only a poor waitress, with a wrinkled apron, the smell of soap on my hands, and shoes whose left heel squeaked at every step. He, however, was the most dangerous man in Chicago. Griffin stood beneath the crystal chandeliers, dressed in a black suit that looked like a threat. Beside him, Celeste Mario shone in white and had such a smile that I felt sick.

I had accidentally heard his voice twenty minutes earlier.

“Accidents happen often after a wedding,” Celeste was saying in the back hall. “When everything is in my name, no one will suspect anything.”

At that time I was standing by the door of the small kitchen and polishing a silver tray. The little swallow engraved on the edge of the tray reminded me of the only thing left to me from my mother. My finger froze on its surface. Then Celeste added:

“First, the toast. Then the car. One month of mourning and the entire fortune is mine.”

About two hundred guests stood in the hall. Men dressed in expensive suits, women with heavy jewelry, and Griffin’s loyal guards, who watched every door. But I knew that among them there were also people bought by Celeste.

Shouting from a distance would not help me. Before I finished a word, someone would cover my mouth.

So I did the craziest thing.

I ran up the stairs, ignored the wedding organizer’s shout, grabbed Griffin by the collar of his shirt, and kissed him in front of everyone.

The glasses stopped in the air.

The color left Celeste’s face.

Griffin’s hand wrapped around my waist with lightning speed. The cold ring on his finger touched me, and several armed guards in the hall simultaneously released the safety locks.

“Let go of him!” someone hissed.

But I did not move away for another second. I said quietly by his lips:

“You will drink nothing. Your bride is planning your burial after the wedding.”

Griffin did not move. He did not make a sound either. Only his eyes grew darker.

Celeste laughed briefly.

“A desperate trick. Take this girl out.”

Two men came toward me. One grabbed me by the arm so hard that I lost my balance. The tray fell onto the marble floor, and the sharp sound silenced the entire hall.

Griffin raised his hand.

Everyone stopped where they were.

His gaze was still fixed on me. Then he looked at Celeste. I put my hand into the pocket of my apron and took out the phone that Celeste had left on the fireplace in the private hall a little earlier.

The screen was still open.

A new message appeared at that very moment.

Griffin looked over quickly. The blood drained from Celeste’s face.

I held the phone out toward him, but did not give it to him yet. One sentence was glowing on the screen: “Now. Do not let him change the route.”

Griffin took a step forward.

“Elene,” he pronounced my name for the first time, “where did you find this phone?”

Celeste raised her hand, as if she could stop the answer.

And just then Griffin’s fingers reached toward the screen…

And just then Griffin’s fingers reached toward the screen. The phone lit up once more in my hand with a dry buzz.

Griffin snatched it from my wrist. He read the message and his face did not change, but it was as if the hall stopped breathing.

“Now,” it said on the screen. “Do not let him change the route.”

Celeste stepped forward. There was still silk in her voice, although her fingers were trembling.

“This phone is not mine.”

Griffin slowly raised his head.

“Then why did facial recognition recognize you?”

“Griffin, that girl is lying to you.”

“You did not answer my question.”

David, Griffin’s head of security, standing in the corner of the hall, took the phone. He brought Celeste’s face to the camera. The screen opened immediately.

Celeste took one step backward. Her shoe made a small, sharp sound on the marble.

“This is illegal,” she said.

“What we find in this phone will be more illegal,” I replied.

Griffin looked toward me.

“Who are you?”

I had hidden the answer to this question for many months. Everyone thought I worked in the hotel kitchen and collected guests’ glasses in the evenings. In reality, I worked in the finance department of the same hotel, only under a false surname. I found my father’s signature in the accounts of Griffin’s company. Father had died two years earlier, and all the files of his last audit had disappeared.

“A person who knows where your money is going,” I told him.

Celeste snickered.

“Do not believe her. She kissed you for money.”

For the first time, I looked directly into her eyes.

“No. I kissed you because you were preparing him for a coffin.”

Griffin touched the screen with his finger. The folders opened one after another: images of transfers, a car number, the driver’s schedule, and audio recordings.

David played one of the recordings.

First a man’s voice sounded. Then Celeste’s—calm, cold, and confident.

“I will need one month of mourning. Then I will sign everything.”

The hall fell silent. The music stopped because the pianist’s fingers froze on the keys.

Celeste looked at Griffin.

“It has been edited.”

“It is your voice,” Griffin said.

“Someone may have imitated me.”

David opened the second recording. There Celeste was already speaking specifically about the toast, the car, and the road on which Griffin was supposed to leave after the wedding.

Griffin’s jaw tightened.

“Who is the driver of the car?” he asked.

David checked the number and suddenly fell silent.

“Say it,” Griffin ordered.

“The car left from your own garage. The driver is our man.”

Celeste reached a hand toward Griffin.

“All of this is a conspiracy against me.”

“Then let us listen to the last recording too,” I said.

Griffin watched me.

“You knew it was there?”

“I knew there was one voice. I did not know whose.”

David opened the last file.

The man said several words. Only several.

But I recognized the voice immediately. He had stood beside Celeste in the private hall. That person had sat at Griffin’s table. That person whom the entire hall trusted most.

Griffin slowly looked over his guests.

“Play it again,” he said.

The recording sounded.

And for the first time real fear appeared on Griffin’s face, because the voice was that of his own brother, Adrian…

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And for the first time real fear appeared on Griffin’s face, because the voice was that of his own brother, Adrian.

In the hall Adrian slowly stood up. He was still holding a champagne glass in his hand, but the liquid had spilled over his fingers as if he did not notice it at all.

“That is not my voice,” he said.

Griffin tilted his head slightly.

“Then why does this man say exactly the words about my car that only you knew?”

“Because someone processed the recording.”

“Who can sound so similar to your voice?”

Adrian looked at Celeste. For the first time, Celeste could not withstand his gaze.

David played the audio again.

“When he drinks the toast, he will get behind the wheel in five minutes. We have already tampered with the brakes. The road will do the rest.”

Then Celeste’s voice sounded:

“Then everything will pass into my name.”

Griffin put the glass on the table. The crystal edge touched his fingers and broke.

“You planned to kill me,” he said.

Celeste turned pale.

“Griffin, listen to me.”

“I have been listening to you all evening.”

“I was only talking about money. Words do not mean that I would really do anything.”

“Are the car brakes only words too?”

This time Adrian tried to go toward the door. David blocked his way.

“Put your hands to the side,” he told him.

Adrian fixed his gaze on Griffin.

“You blame me for everything. Father left the company to both of us, but you took everything.”

“So you decided on my death?”

“I did not want to kill you!”

“But the planned car was yours,” I said.

Everyone turned toward me.

I took a small memory card from my pocket. I had found it under the tray, in the service cart. The date on it was written in the same hand that had labeled my father’s missing audit files.

Griffin took the card from me.

“Where did you find this?”

“In your hotel, in Father’s old office. There I learned that your company’s money had been going into a separate account for years. Adrian controlled the account. But Celeste’s signature was also on the last transfer.”

Celeste shook her head.

“That is impossible.”

“No,” I said. “The only impossible thing was that you thought a poor waitress could not ask questions.”

Griffin gave the card to David. Signatures, account numbers, and video footage appeared on the screen. In one of the shots Celeste was handing Adrian a bag full of money. In the second shot Adrian was opening the hood of the car.

Celeste’s lips opened, but no voice came out anymore.

Adrian put a hand on the chair.

“Griffin, listen to me. After the wedding we only had to lose control of the steering. It was supposed to be an accident, not murder.”

“Are you making this lighter now?” I asked.

Griffin looked toward me. There was gratitude in his eyes, but something else was hidden behind it.

“Elene, why did you do all this for me?”

I was silent for a long time.

“Because before my father died, he told me: if Griffin dies, the truth will be buried forever. I only finished his last case.”

Another message arrived on David’s phone. He read it and his face changed.

“Griffin, there are police cars outside. But this message came not to Adrian’s phone, but to Celeste’s old number.”

Griffin took the phone from me.

The screen said: “If the recording was played, the next car is for Elene.”

Celeste exhaled loudly.

Adrian also looked at her with fear for the first time.

And I realized that the wedding hall was only the first trap. The real danger was already waiting outside, and Griffin still did not know in whose name that second car had been hired…