They looked at the cabinet, at the safe. No sign of forced entry.
“Who has access?” the female officer asked.
“Me and my son,” Margaret said. “And the staff who clean.”
Clara and Paula stood near the doorway, feeling like they were being photographed for a wanted poster.
“We’ll need a list of all employees who were in the house today,” the officer said. “And your security footage.”
Adam nodded, jaw tight. “We have cameras in most of the common areas,” he said. “I’ll send the files over.”
Clara watched his face as he spoke.
He looked torn.
Like he wanted to believe her.
Like he wasn’t sure if he could.
They questioned Clara in the small sitting room off the kitchen.
“Have you ever been in trouble with the law?” the male officer asked.
“No,” she said. “Never.”
“Any financial problems? Debts?”
She thought of the hospital bill still sitting on her own kitchen counter at home, the one from when her mother fell and broke her hip.
“Everyone has bills,” she said. “But I pay what I can. I don’t steal.”
“How exactly did you spend your morning?” they asked.
She told them. In order. Down to the minute.
They wrote it all down.
When they left, her hands were shaking.
Ethan found her in the pantry, sitting on an upside-down crate, breathing hard.
“Clara?” he asked, peeking in. “Why are the police here?”
She wiped at her eyes quickly.
“Somebody lost something important,” she said. “They’re trying to find it.”
“Did you lose it?” he asked.
“No,” she said. “I didn’t.”
He walked over and hugged her around the waist.
“I know,” he said.
Her throat tightened.
Two days later, they arrested her.
At her apartment.
In front of her neighbors.
She’d just come home from the grocery store, paper bag in her arms, when a police car pulled up and two officers stepped out.
“Clara Alvarez?” one asked.
“Yes?” she said, heart racing.
“You’re under arrest for theft,” he said.
The world blurred.
The bag slipped out of her hands, oranges rolling across the hallway floor.
Her landlord peeked out from his door. Mrs. Ortega from 2B gasped and whispered something into her phone.
Clara wanted to sink into the floor.
“I didn’t…” she started.
“You can tell it to the judge,” the officer said, though his tone wasn’t unkind. “You have the right to remain silent…”
She barely heard the rest over the rushing in her ears.
At the station, they took her fingerprints.
They took her earrings.
They took her belt.
They put her in a cell with another woman who smelled like cigarettes and bad luck.
No one came for her.
No one called.
She asked for a lawyer.
They told her one would be appointed.
It didn’t happen that day.
Or the next.
The story hit the news that weekend.
“Millionaire Hamilton Family Robbed by Longtime Maid,” one headline read.
Another: “Trusted Housekeeper Betrays Hamilton Legacy.”
Clara didn’t have a TV in her apartment, but she saw the papers.
Her picture—a ten-year-old employee badge photo with too-harsh lighting—was plastered on every local site.
“Did you do it?” the woman in the cell asked.
“No,” Clara said.
The woman shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. They think you did.”
On Monday, they arraigned her.
No one stood beside her at the defense table.
The Hamiltons’ lawyer was there, though.
Clara recognized him from articles. Victor Hale. Sharp, expensive suit, sharp, expensive haircut. He didn’t look at her.
The judge set bail higher than she could ever afford.
She stayed where she was.
Alone.
That afternoon, a young woman in an off-the-rack blazer approached her in the holding area behind the courtroom.
“Ms. Alvarez?” she said. “My name’s Jenna Park. I’m… technically not a lawyer yet. I’m a legal intern with the public defender’s office.”
Clara blinked.
“They said you didn’t have anyone,” Jenna went on. “So I… asked my supervisor if I could at least meet you. See if we can get someone assigned.”
Clara stared at her for a moment.
Then she burst into tears.
They released Clara to await trial with an ankle monitor and conditions attached—curfew, check-ins, no contact with the Hamiltons.
She went home to her small one-bedroom, sat on the couch she’d bought from a thrift store, and stared at the wall.
Her phone was quiet.
No calls from Adam.
None from Margaret.
None from anyone with the last name Hamilton.
Until two nights later.
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