Chương 6
The accusation came out sharper than he intended.
Claire flinched.
A small movement.
Almost invisible.
But Daniel saw it.
"I didn't know what to tell you," she said.
"You could have told me someone was looking for something from my sister."
"I didn't know if he was looking for the same thing she was trying to send."
Daniel stood and walked to the kitchen.
He opened a cabinet without knowing why.
Inside were old plates, a cracked bowl, and a coffee container he had forgotten to replace.
The ordinary things made him angry.
His life had continued while something impossible had been happening beside it.
"How long have you known about Emily?" he asked.
Claire did not answer immediately.
"Since before I moved here."
Daniel turned around.
"What?"
She looked uncomfortable.
"My sister was in the same recovery program as Emily."
The room went quiet.
Daniel stared at her.
"Recovery program?"
Claire nodded.
"They met about two years before Emily disappeared."
Daniel felt something inside him shift.
Not break.
Something worse.
A piece moving into a new position.
"Emily never told me she was in a program."
"She probably didn't want you to know."
"Why?"
Claire gave him a tired look.
"Because you were her brother."
That answer offended him because it sounded too simple.
"Explain."
Claire looked down at her hands.
"Emily talked about you."
Daniel stopped moving.
"What did she say?"
"Not much."
"That doesn't sound like talking."
"That's because she didn't like talking about people when she was angry."
A faint sadness crossed Claire's face.
"She said you were the person she trusted most."
Daniel swallowed.
The sentence should have comforted him.
Instead, it felt heavy.
"What else?"
Claire hesitated.
"She said you were also the person who could hurt her the most."
Daniel looked away.
He did not argue.
There was nothing to argue.
The kitchen light above him flickered once.
He remembered a night eleven years earlier when Emily had called him six times.
He had watched the phone screen light up while he sat in his car outside his apartment.
He had been angry because she had borrowed money again.
Angry because she promised she was changing.
Angry because he was tired.
The seventh call never came.
The next morning, he deleted the notification.
Not the voicemail.
Just the notification.
At the time, that felt like control.
Now it felt like evidence.
"Where is Thomas Vale?" Daniel asked.
Claire looked surprised.
"I don't know."
"Can you contact him?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because he contacted me."
"That's not the same thing."
"No."
She looked at him carefully.
"It's not."
Daniel returned to the table and picked up the letter.
The paper shook slightly.
He hated that Claire noticed.
He hated even more that he could not stop it.
"Did Emily ever talk about someone hurting her?"
Claire nodded slowly.
"Yes."
"Who?"
"She never said."
"She must have said something."
"She said she had made a mistake."
Daniel waited.
"She said she trusted the wrong person."
"That's it?"
"No."
Claire looked toward the hallway.
"She said if anything happened to her, people would believe the easiest explanation."
Daniel felt cold.
"Meaning?"
"Meaning they would believe she disappeared because of who she was."
The words followed him into the silence.
Daniel sat down again.
For years, every person who mentioned Emily had used the same careful phrases.
She struggled.
She made choices.
She had problems.
Nobody had asked what happened to her.
They had only discussed what was wrong with her.
"Why are you telling me this now?" he asked.
Claire gave a small, humorless laugh.
"Because I am tired."
"Tired of what?"
"Being afraid of a man I don't even know."
The answer surprised him.
Claire looked older than she had an hour earlier.
"I thought if I stayed quiet, it would stay away from me."
Daniel looked at the letter.
"And now?"
"Now it's in your apartment."
Neither of them spoke for several seconds.
A car passed outside, its headlights moving across the ceiling.
Somewhere above them, a child ran across a floor and someone told them to stop.
The world continued with its usual indifference.
Daniel folded the letter carefully.
"Where did you see Thomas?"
Claire hesitated.
"Daniel."
"Where?"
"At the station."
"When?"
"Three weeks ago."
"Why were you there?"
She looked uncomfortable again.
This time, the silence lasted longer.
"I was meeting Emily."
Daniel stopped.
The words did not make sense.
"What?"
Claire looked down.
"I know how that sounds."
"How does it sound?"
"Impossible."
"Because she was dead."
Claire nodded.
"Yes."
Daniel pushed back from the table.
"You met my dead sister three weeks ago?"
"I met someone who said she was Emily."
The apartment seemed to tilt.
Daniel stared at her.
"Did you see her face?"
"Yes."
"Was it her?"
Claire's eyes filled with something close to guilt.
"I don't know."
That answer was worse than anything else she could have said.
Daniel stood there, unable to decide whether he was angry, terrified, or relieved.
All three emotions arrived at once.
"Tell me exactly what happened," he said.
Claire looked at the letter between them.
Then she looked at the locked apartment door.
"Before I do," she said quietly, "you need to understand something."
"What?"
"If Emily is alive, someone has spent eleven years making sure you believed she wasn't."
Daniel waited for the rest.
Claire's voice dropped.
"And whoever did that knows you are looking now."
Daniel stared at the phone until the screen went dark.
The message remained in his mind even after the words disappeared.
"I know you found the letter."
Claire watched him carefully.
"Are you going to answer?"
Daniel did not move.
"No."
"Why?"
"Because I don't know who I'm talking to."
Claire nodded slowly.
"That might be the smartest thing you've done tonight."
He looked at her.
"That sounded almost like a compliment."
"It wasn't."
For a moment, the tension loosened just enough for both of them to breathe.
May you like
Then Daniel's phone vibrated again.
This time it was a text.
