Chapter 4 - The Eighth Night
The room Mrs. Pace took us into had no windows.
There was a sofa, a bathroom, shelves of blankets, and a telephone fixed to the wall.
I noticed all of it with an attention so sharp that it felt separate from my body.
Junie clung to my neck.
“Why are we hiding?”
“Because there are people outside who aren’t supposed to be here.”
“Like Quincy?”
The question nearly broke me.
I sat on the sofa and pulled her into my lap.
“Not exactly like Quincy.”
It was the best truth I could manage.
Mrs. Pace knelt beside us.
“Would you help me count the buttons on this cardigan?”
Junie looked at her as though the request were absurd.
Then a sound came from outside.
Sharp.
Distant.
Her hands tightened in my shirt.
Mrs. Pace started counting anyway.
“One.”
I understood what she was doing.
“Two,” I said.
Junie swallowed.
“Three.”
We counted the buttons three times.
Beyond the door, feet moved quickly.
Someone spoke into a radio.
I heard Nico’s voice once, calm and clipped, then nothing.
The silence was worse than the noise.
I thought about Elena Ortiz standing outside the bathroom.
I thought about how many times a person could promise a child that everything would be all right before the words became a kind of betrayal.
Junie pressed her face into my chest.
“Is Mr. Nico scared?”
“Probably.”
“Even though he’s big?”
“Even then.”
She considered that.
“He can borrow Button longer.”
I closed my eyes.
“Yes, baby.”
The wall telephone rang.
Mrs. Pace answered.
She listened.
Then she handed it to me.
Nico.
“You’re safe where you are.”
“What’s happening?”
“The people outside aren’t getting into that room.”
“Dom?”
A pause.
“He’s hurt. He’s being helped.”
My stomach dropped.
“How badly?”
“Not badly enough to stop complaining.”
I let out a breath that shook.
Nico’s voice softened.
“Keep talking to your daughter.”
Then he was gone.
By dawn, the estate was full of law enforcement officers who had not arrived through Dean Whittaker.
Nico’s attorney had contacted a senior federal prosecutor through an established channel, reported the attack, and specifically warned that an agent might be compromised.
I learned those details later.
At the time, I only knew that a woman with credentials came into the room, introduced herself as Special Agent Lena Morales, and asked whether I wanted an attorney before speaking.
It was the first question anyone in authority had asked that made me feel less trapped.
“Yes.”
She nodded.
“We’ll arrange that.”
Junie slept through the beginning of the interview, curled beside Mrs. Pace beneath a knitted blanket.
I told Morales about the transmitter.
The whale.
Whittaker’s instructions.
Every report.
Every question about exits, schedules, and locked rooms.
She listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she said, “You were placed in an impossible position.”
I started crying then.
Not loudly.
Not gracefully.
Just tears I couldn’t stop while a stranger passed me tissues and waited.
Later, Nico found me in the kitchen.
He had changed into a gray cardigan.
There was a small cut near his temple.
“Dom?” I asked.
“A leg wound. The doctor expects him to recover.”
“And the men outside?”
“Two were taken into custody here. The others were caught nearby.”
“Whittaker?”
“Not yet.”
I wrapped both hands around a cup I hadn’t drunk from.
“You knew I was reporting.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
He sat across from me.
“The sitting room had audio surveillance. It was installed before you arrived.”
I looked up.
“The bedrooms?”
“No.”
“But you listened without telling me.”
“Yes.”
I stared at him.
He accepted it.
“I wanted to know who had sent you into my house and why.”
“So we both lied.”
“Yes.”
For a moment, the kitchen held only the sound of rain dripping from the eaves.
Then I said, “I’m sorry.”
He looked toward the hallway where my daughter slept.
“So am I.”
Neither apology erased anything.
But they made room for a different conversation.
“Why did you let us stay?” I asked. “After you knew?”
Nico removed his glasses.
He looked suddenly exhausted.
“Because you were frightened. Because your child was five. Because whatever they asked you to do, neither of those things changed.”
My throat tightened.
I looked away before he could see.
From the doorway, Junie’s small voice interrupted us.
“Did Button get hurt?”
I turned.
Mrs. Pace stood behind her.
Nico rose carefully.
“He needs some repairs.”
“Can you fix him?”
He crouched in front of her.
“I can try.”
She considered him.
Then she touched the cut near his temple with one careful finger.
“You too.”
Nico closed his eyes for a moment.
When he opened them, they shone.
May you like
“Yes,” he said.
“Me too.”
