The Steak on the Floor
Chapter 01 - The Steak on the Floor
The steak hit the kitchen floor before Rachel Sterling understood why her husband was smiling.
Dinner had been planned as a private celebration for Graham Sterling’s sixty-fifth birthday. The dining room beyond the open kitchen was set for fourteen people, but only three had arrived early: Rachel, her husband Nathan, and his mother, Vivienne.
Rain pressed against the windows of the Sterling mansion. Pendant lights reflected off white marble counters. Vivienne stood beside the island in a cream silk blouse and pleated beige skirt, slowly drinking chardonnay as though the kitchen were a theater built for her alone.
Nathan cut into the steak Rachel had prepared.
The center was brown instead of pink.
He looked at the meat, then at his wife.
“What did I ask for?”
“Medium rare.”
“And what is this?”
“Overcooked. I can make another.”
Rachel reached for the plate.
Nathan swept it from the counter.
The plate shattered near her feet.
She flinched.
Vivienne did not.
Nathan caught Rachel by the wrist. He wore a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, his dark hair perfectly combed even after a twelve-hour workday. To the outside world, he was the disciplined heir to Sterling Domestic Technologies, a family company famous for luxury smart homes.
Inside the house, discipline meant something else.
“Nathan,” Rachel whispered. “Let go.”
“You embarrass me in front of my mother and think replacing the steak fixes it?”
Vivienne lifted her glass.
“She has never understood standards.”
Nathan pulled Rachel toward the stove.
A cast-iron pan still rested on the burner.
Rachel saw what he intended one second before it happened.
“No.”
He forced the side of her right hand against the hot handle.
Pain flashed through her arm.
Rachel cried out and dropped to her knees. The contact lasted only a moment, but the skin across her fingers reddened immediately.
Nathan released her.
“Now you will remember the temperature.”
Vivienne took another sip of wine.
“Stop making that noise. The guests will hear.”
Rachel cradled her hand against her apron, fighting nausea.
A small cube-shaped device sat beneath the lowest kitchen cabinet near the spilled sauce. Nathan had told her months earlier that it was a discontinued motion sensor and no longer connected to the home network.
As Rachel’s face came level with the floor, a tiny light appeared on its front.
Blue.
One blink.
Then another.
Nathan followed her gaze.
His expression changed.
“Why is that on?”
Vivienne’s wineglass stopped halfway to her mouth.
Rachel forgot the pain for one impossible second.
Nathan crossed the kitchen and kicked the device beneath the cabinet.
The blue light continued blinking in the darkness.
From the dining room, the doorbell rang.
May you like
The birthday guests had arrived.
And somewhere beyond the walls of the Sterling mansion, the camera had already begun uploading everything it had seen.
