She Fell for the College Janitor Everyone Looked Down On
Chapter 8
They escaped through a narrow maintenance passage Samuel knew from years of repairing the tower.
Caldwell’s men chased them.
Eleanor lifted her skirt and ran down the stairs.
Samuel pushed open a hidden door.
They emerged behind the chapel.
“Where now?” she whispered.
“Stable.”
They reached the carriage house.
A college worker owed Samuel a favor.
He gave them a horse and small cart.
They rode before sunrise.
The ledger remained hidden beneath the seat.
Eleanor looked back at Hawthorne.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For bringing you into this.”
Samuel laughed softly.
“You didn’t.”
“My family did.”
“Your family isn’t you.”
She looked at him.
“That is exactly what I was trying to tell you.”
They reached an abandoned mill outside the town.
There, Samuel opened the ledger again.
The evidence was worse than they imagined.
The trustees had been diverting college funds.
They had manipulated land deeds.
They had accepted money from merchants.
They had arranged examinations for wealthy students.
Nathaniel Reed had discovered the scheme.
The final entries were dated three years earlier.
Then the records stopped.
Samuel’s finger trembled.
“My father didn’t leave voluntarily.”
Eleanor stared.
“What do you mean?”
“He disappeared.”
She looked at him.
“I thought he died after leaving Hawthorne.”
“He did die.”
Samuel’s voice broke.
“But no one ever told me where they found him.”
Eleanor stepped closer.
“Samuel…”
He opened a final page.
There was a note.
If I am gone, look beneath the chapel.
Eleanor’s eyes widened.
“The chapel.”
“We searched the tower.”
“Not beneath it.”
They returned that night.
Samuel had keys to nearly every building.
They entered through the rear.
Beneath the chapel was a sealed cellar.
Inside they found boxes.
Letters.
Receipts.
And one wooden chest.
Samuel opened it.
Inside was Nathaniel Reed’s personal journal.
The final entry was dated the night before his disappearance.
I know who ordered it.
Below that, one name.
Eleanor’s father.
She covered her mouth.
Samuel stood motionless.
Then he turned the page.
The next sentence was worse.
But he is not the man truly in control.
