Chapter 2 - The Photograph
Dominic put the gun away.
Clara watched the movement, unwilling to mistake it for trust.
“Show me.”
She handed him her phone.
The photograph showed a young woman sitting beside a kitchen window. Her dark hair was tied back. A yellow mug rested between her hands.
At first glance, it could have been an ordinary picture.
Then Dominic enlarged it.
A lock had been fitted to the outside of the kitchen door.
Clara had studied that lock until she saw it whenever she closed her eyes.
“What’s her name?”
“Elise.”
“How old?”
“Twenty-three.”
“And you believed she was dead?”
“Our house burned when I was eleven. My mother told me Elise was staying with relatives afterward. Then my father said she’d died from complications.”
Dominic looked up.
“Your mother accepted that?”
“My mother disappeared two months later.”
The word had lived inside Clara for sixteen years.
Disappeared sounded temporary.
It had allowed a child to imagine delayed trains, wrong addresses, a woman trying to find her way home.
Now she knew what adults had been avoiding when they used it.
“Who told you she died?” Dominic asked.
“My father. Years later. He said she’d taken money and betrayed him.”
“And you believed him?”
“I was a child.”
The answer came harder than she intended.
Dominic accepted it without argument.
“Yes,” he said. “You were.”
Clara looked away.
Leo returned carrying a tablet.
“The building is secure enough to move. Margot’s waiting downstairs.”
“Who’s Margot?” Clara asked.
“A doctor,” Dominic said. “Someone outside our regular staff.”
“Because you think somebody here helped him.”
“Because I’m not ignoring possibilities.”
Leo studied the photograph.
“There’s a newspaper on the counter.”
Clara leaned forward.
He enlarged the corner.
The date was visible.
Four days earlier.
Fresh proof.
Fresh terror.
Dominic set the phone down.
“Did he demand the key?”
“He demanded everything my mother left.”
“Does he know where the unit is?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Do you?”
“Pittsburgh.”
Leo looked at Dominic.
A silent conversation passed between them.
Clara disliked how familiar she had become with men making decisions over her head.
“I’m coming.”
“No,” Dominic said.
She stiffened.
He noticed.
Then he corrected himself.
“You’re injured, and someone may be watching for you. We need another option.”
It was a small change.
An explanation instead of an order.
She held on to it.
“The unit is in my mother’s name. You may need me.”
“We’ll call an attorney and determine what’s required.”
“An attorney?”
“Yes.”
“I brought you evidence against your enemy.”
“You brought me a key and a photograph.”
Clara lowered her eyes.
He wasn’t being cruel.
He was refusing to pretend.
That frightened her less than immediate promises would have.
They moved through a rear corridor to a waiting car.
Margot examined Clara at a private clinic after normal appointments ended. There was bruising, a shallow cut, and no sign of a fracture.
When the doctor asked about the scar, Clara said she didn’t want to discuss it.
Margot nodded.
“Then we won’t.”
Dominic remained outside.
Later, an attorney arrived.
Nora Serrano wore a navy coat and carried a leather notebook worn at the corners.
She asked whether Clara wanted Dominic present.
Clara thought carefully.
“For now.”
Nora listened to everything.
Then she said, “You need independent advice. My duty will be to you.”
Clara looked at Dominic.
He nodded.
“I’ll leave when you ask.”
For the first time that afternoon, Clara felt something beyond fear.
Not safety yet.
The possibility of it.
Nora asked about her mother’s full name.
“Madeleine Hale Morelli.”
The attorney’s pen stopped.
“What?”
Nora took a breath.
“I knew a prosecutor who investigated her disappearance.”
Clara gripped the chair.
“What happened to the investigation?”
“It stalled.”
“Why?”
Nora looked toward Dominic.
Then back at Clara.
“The lead witness withdrew his statement.”
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“Who?”
“Alexei Volkov.”
