Chương 5
“Then obtain them directly.”
“I requested an emergency preservation order at six this morning.”
Daniel said nothing.
She noticed. “You expected me not to?”
“I expected delay.”
“Rich suspects delay consequences. They do not own every clock.”
For the first time, he felt something close to relief. It arrived with resentment attached.
Alvarez continued, “I also have a problem. Campus security says your daughter arrived at Halden House uninvited and threatened to publish stolen financial documents unless the students gave her money.”
“That is a lie.”
“Probably.”
“Probably?”
“I don’t confuse certainty with loyalty.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“Lily’s roommate is missing,” Alvarez said. “Nora Bell. Her mother says she has not answered since last night. Campus police checked the dorm room and found it empty.”
Daniel thought of Marcus’s warning. “Was it searched?”
“There were signs someone went through the desk.”
“And you were going to tell me when?”
“I am telling you now.”
“Where is the room?”
“You are not going there.”
“She may be in danger.”
“So may you, if you keep interpreting every fact as permission.”
Maya appeared at the end of the corridor and looked from one to the other. “Lily is awake.”
The argument vanished.
Lily’s eyes were open when Daniel entered. The swelling made her expression difficult to read, but her gaze followed him. A rigid support held her jaw. A nasal cannula rested beneath her nose, and a bandage covered the left side of her head.
Maya held a small whiteboard and marker.
“No speaking,” she told Lily. “Not even trying. Your jaw has been stabilized, and we are planning surgery after the swelling improves.”
Lily blinked once.
Maya placed the marker in her right hand. Her fingers closed weakly, then lost it. Daniel bent to retrieve it. When he offered it back, Lily looked at his plain shirt before taking it.
She wrote slowly.
NORA?
Alvarez stepped closer. “We’re looking for her.”
Lily’s hand tightened around the marker.
DONT CALL CAMPUS.
“We won’t rely on campus security,” Alvarez said.
Lily stared at her, deciding whether the distinction mattered.
Daniel crouched beside the bed. “Did Tyler hurt you?”
Her eyes shifted to him. The marker hovered above the board.
She wrote three letters.
ALL.
Daniel felt the room tilt, though nothing moved.
“Did all three strike you?” Alvarez asked.
Lily erased the word with the side of her palm and wrote again.
NOT ETHAN FIRST.
Alvarez pulled a chair to the bed. “Take your time.”
Lily’s breathing quickened. The heart monitor climbed.
Maya touched her shoulder. “Stop if it hurts.”
Lily shook her head by less than an inch and grimaced. She wrote:
FOUND PAYMENTS.
Then:
CALEB RIOS.
Alvarez’s pen paused. “The student who died two years ago?”
Lily nodded once.
Daniel had read the university’s announcement when it happened. Caleb Rios, twenty, found unconscious after a fraternity event. The official explanation involved alcohol and an undiagnosed heart condition. His parents had asked for privacy. The story disappeared within a week.
Lily wrote:
NORA HAS COPY.
The marker slipped from her fingers.
Maya took the board. “Enough.”
Lily reached for it again.
“Enough,” Maya repeated. “You can help by staying conscious and letting your brain recover.”
Lily’s eyes filled with anger, not tears. She looked at Daniel.
He understood the request even before she wrote it.
FIND HER.
Daniel nodded.
Alvarez saw him. “The police will find her.”
Lily looked from Alvarez to Daniel, then wrote one final line with letters that slanted downward.
NO GHOST.
The monitor beeped faster.
Daniel stared at the words.
Maya removed the board and adjusted Lily’s oxygen. “Rest.”
Lily closed her eyes, but her fingers remained curled as though still holding the marker.
Outside the room, Alvarez blocked Daniel’s path.
“You are not going after Nora Bell.”
“My daughter asked me to find her.”
“She also told you not to become whatever the internet thinks you are.”
“She doesn’t know what that means.”
“Do you?”
Daniel stepped closer. Alvarez did not move.
“Find Nora,” he said.
“We are trying.”
“Try faster.”
“I had officers at the bus station, airport, dorm, her mother’s house, and the homes of three friends before you changed your shirt. I have requested her phone records. I have asked transit police to check platform cameras. What I do not have is magic.”
“I might have something better.”
“That sentence is why your daughter wrote what she wrote.”
Daniel walked past her.
He did not go to campus.
He drove to a twenty-four-hour diner across from the university and ordered eggs he did not eat. From a booth near the window, he watched students cross the street under umbrellas, some slowing when they recognized him. One lifted a phone. Daniel turned his face away.
Marcus called through the encrypted device.
“I found Nora.”
“Where?”
“Her phone pinged near a train station at 1:16 this morning, then went dark. Before that, she used a rideshare account to travel to an apartment in Westbridge.”
“Whose apartment?”
“Avery Sloan. Junior accountant in the university development office.”
“Lily’s source?”
“Likely.”
“Address.”
Marcus gave it to him.
Daniel left cash beneath the coffee cup and stood.
“Call Alvarez,” Marcus said.
“She’ll take too long.”
“She has badges, warrants, and people who can enter an apartment without making the evening news.”
“Nora may not have an evening.”
“And you may be exactly what someone wants moving without backup.”
Daniel stopped near the diner door.
Marcus continued, “Night Glass taught you to treat delay as danger. This is not a collapsed government. You are in Virginia. There are traffic cameras and homeowner associations.”
“Meridian is involved.”
“I know.”
“They searched my name before Lily was attacked.”
“I know.”
“They took the footage.”
“I know.”
“Then stop talking to me like this is normal.”
May you like
“I’m talking to you like you have a daughter in intensive care who asked you not to disappear into an old name.”
The waitress approached with a plate of toast. Daniel realized he had left before the order arrived. She looked at the money under the cup.
