Chương 2
“The woman at the elevator said Mom left something for me.”
“What woman?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you know her?”
Sophie shook her head.
“She knew my name.”
Daniel looked at Victoria.
Victoria’s face had gone still again, but it was no longer the controlled stillness she wore in boardrooms and hotel lobbies. This was calculation.
“What elevator?” she asked.
“The one by the ballroom.”
Victoria closed her eyes for half a second.
Martin shifted beside the sedan.
Daniel raised the steel tool.
“Don’t move.”
Martin lifted his hand.
“All right.”
“You stay right there.”
“Daniel,” Victoria said, “we need to move.”
“No. We need answers.”
“We need Sophie upstairs.”
“I’m not taking her anywhere until I know what’s happening.”
Martin looked toward the garage entrance.
Sirens were faint beyond the rain.
He smiled again.
“You’re about to get plenty of answers.”
Victoria crossed the space between them.
Daniel moved Sophie farther behind him.
Victoria stopped.
That hurt her.
He saw it.
Good, he thought.
Then hated himself for thinking it.
Victoria removed one glove.
Her bare hand shook.
Only slightly.
She reached into her coat and took out her phone.
On the screen was a photograph.
Daniel looked at it.
His stomach tightened.
It showed Sophie leaving the hotel ballroom twenty minutes earlier.
The image had been sent from an unknown number.
Beneath it was a message.
LET HER COME DOWN ALONE OR DANIEL GETS THE VIDEO.
Daniel read it twice.
“What video?”
Victoria looked at Martin.
Martin gave a tiny shrug.
“You should ask your wife.”
Daniel almost laughed.
It came out as air.
“My wife is dead.”
Martin’s expression changed.
Not much.
Enough.
“I know.”
Daniel took a step toward him.
“What video?”
Victoria caught his sleeve.
“Not here.”
He pulled free.
“What video?”
“Daniel.”
“What did Rachel leave?”
Martin said, “Proof.”
The sirens were closer now.
Victoria looked toward the ramp again.
Martin stepped backward.
Daniel lifted the steel tool.
“Don’t.”
Martin stopped.
“You really don’t remember me very well.”
“I remember enough.”
“Then you remember I don’t bluff.”
“No. I remember you hit my father with a tire iron behind a warehouse in Baltimore.”
Sophie made a small sound.
Daniel shut his eyes.
Too late.
He turned.
Her face had changed.
He had spent eight years trying to keep adult ugliness from reaching her before she had enough bones around her to survive it. He had failed in under five minutes.
“Sophie.”
She looked at the tool in his hand.
Daniel put it down.
It struck the floor with a hollow clank.
“Sorry.”
Martin watched him.
Something like amusement had vanished from his face.
“You’re a better father than Jack was.”
Daniel looked at him.
“Do not say his name.”
“Why? He’s dead too.”
Victoria moved between them.
“Martin, stop.”
“Still protecting him?”
“I’m protecting the child.”
“Little late for that.”
The first police cruiser entered the garage.
Blue light rolled across the wet walls.
Martin did not run.
That frightened Daniel more than if he had.
Two officers stepped out with their hands near their weapons. Victoria immediately raised both hands and identified herself. Daniel moved Sophie fully behind the pillar.
Martin remained beside the sedan.
One officer ordered everyone to show their hands.
Martin complied.
The second officer approached him.
“Sir, step away from the vehicle.”
Martin did.
Daniel watched the officer pat him down.
No weapon.
No phone.
Nothing except a hotel key card and a folded receipt.
The first officer came to Daniel.
“Sir, are you injured?”
“No.”
“The child?”
“I don’t think so.”
Sophie said, “My shoulder hurts.”
Daniel turned instantly.
“Where?”
She touched the place where the backpack strap had jerked her.
The officer crouched.
“Can I take a look?”
Sophie glanced at Daniel.
He nodded.
She moved her sweater collar enough to reveal reddened skin near her shoulder.
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
The officer noticed the broken padlock.
“Who restrained her?”
Daniel pointed at Victoria.
Victoria said, “I did.”
The officer straightened.
Daniel looked at her.
For the first time since finding Sophie, he had no idea what to say.
Victoria did not defend herself.
The officer asked her to turn around.
Daniel stepped forward.
“Wait.”
Victoria looked at him.
He stopped.
That was the terrible part.
He did not know whether he was trying to save her or stop her from getting away.
Victoria placed her hands behind her back.
The cuffs clicked shut.
Sophie whispered, “Dad, she saved me.”
The officer heard her.
“So she didn’t lock you there?”
Sophie looked confused.
“She did.”
Daniel rubbed both hands over his face.
The rain had become louder.
“Okay,” the officer said. “Nobody explain anything yet.”
It was perhaps the most sensible thing anyone had said.
More police arrived.
Martin was separated from them. Victoria was placed near a cruiser but not inside it. Sophie sat on a concrete parking barrier while a paramedic examined her shoulder.
Daniel stood beside her.
He could not stop looking at his sedan.
Its interior light had gone dark again.
The rear door remained open.
A detective arrived twenty minutes later, wearing a rain jacket over plain clothes and carrying a paper cup of coffee she never drank.
Her name was Elena Ruiz.
She listened more than she spoke.
That alone made Daniel trust her slightly.
Not much.
Sophie told the story first.
She had been at a charity dinner upstairs with Daniel. The event benefited a children’s literacy foundation, and Daniel had spent most of the evening pretending he did not hate rooms where wealthy strangers congratulated one another for giving away money they would not miss.
Sophie had been allowed to come because the foundation had been Rachel’s favorite charity.
At 9:17, according to the ballroom cameras, a woman in hotel staff clothing had approached Sophie while Daniel was speaking with two donors.
The woman told her that her mother had left a surprise in Daniel’s car.
Sophie knew her mother was dead.
May you like
That was exactly why she followed.
“She said Mom arranged it before she died,” Sophie told Ruiz. “Like a birthday thing.”
