Chapter 2 - A City That Couldn’t Find Two Boys
By Sunday afternoon, half the people who owed me favors were looking for my nephews.
By Sunday night, I had expanded the search beyond favors.
Chicago police had photographs.
Transit authorities had photographs.
Airport security had photographs.
Every private driver, hotel manager, parking attendant, and building superintendent in my network knew Luca and Nico’s faces.
They had disappeared wearing pajamas.
That detail made everything worse.
Children didn’t travel far barefoot and dressed for bed.
There should have been footage somewhere.
There wasn’t.
My investigators searched every road within twenty miles.
Nothing.
Hospitals.
Nothing.
Bus terminals.
Nothing.
Train stations.
Nothing.
By midnight, I was back in the security room replaying the same eleven missing minutes.
2:13.
Freeze.
2:24.
Return.
Over and over.
Elena sat behind me.
She hadn’t left the estate.
“I want to see their room again,” she said.
“You’ve seen it six times.”
“I’m their mother.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
I turned.
Her eyes were swollen from crying.
At least some of those tears were real.
That confused me more than anything.
If Elena knew something, she was also afraid.
The question was what.
“Did Luca or Nico say anything unusual before you brought them here?”
“No.”
“Did they ask about anyone?”
“No.”
“Did they mention Michael?”
Her entire body became still.
I had not planned to ask it.
The name simply came out.
My younger brother had been dead for fifteen years.
We didn’t talk about him often.
Some losses became easier when you put them in boxes and stopped opening them.
Michael was one of those boxes.
Elena’s response told me I had accidentally touched something important.
“Why would they mention Michael?” she asked.
“I didn’t say they did.”
“Then why ask?”
“Because you reacted.”
“I reacted because my children are missing and you’re talking about our dead brother.”
I watched her carefully.
“Elena.”
“What?”
“Is there something you aren’t telling me?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
“Look at me.”
She did.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
I had spent years interviewing people who believed they could lie to me.
Elena was better than most.
But she was still my sister.
I knew the way her left hand tightened when she was nervous.
I knew how she pressed her tongue briefly against the inside of her cheek when choosing words carefully.
She was doing both.
Before I could push harder, Daniel entered.
“We found something.”
I stood.
“What?”
“Not the boys.”
Elena’s hope disappeared.
Daniel placed a tablet on the desk.
“We checked every security log, including maintenance access.”
“And?”
“At 1:58 Saturday morning, somebody opened a service panel in the basement.”
My house contained several service panels.
Heating.
Water.
Electrical.
Network.
“Which one?”
“Old mechanical corridor.”
I frowned.
“That area was sealed during renovation.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“What does it control?”
Daniel looked uncomfortable.
“Nothing according to current plans.”
“According to current plans?”
“The house is older than the renovation records.”
My estate had been built in the 1920s by an industrial family who had liked privacy as much as I did.
When I purchased it, I had modernized almost everything.
Almost.
Daniel enlarged an architectural diagram.
“There’s a twenty-three-foot section behind the wine cellar that doesn’t match the exterior measurements.”
“A void?”
“Possibly.”
Elena stood.
“No.”
Both of us looked at her.
She seemed to realize she had spoken too quickly.
“No what?” I asked.
“The boys wouldn’t go into some old basement passage.”
“How do you know?”
“They’re children.”
“Children are famous for avoiding secret passages?”
She looked away.
That was enough.
“Daniel. Basement.”
Elena stepped in front of me.
“Vincent.”
“What?”
“Wait.”
“Why?”
“Because maybe you should let the police handle this.”
I almost laughed.
“You’ve spent fourteen hours telling me I’m not doing enough, and now you want me to stop?”
“I just don’t want you tearing the house apart.”
“My nephews are missing.”
I moved around her.
She grabbed my arm.
“Vincent.”
This time there was no performance in her voice.
Only fear.
“What’s behind that wall, Elena?”
She released me.
“I don’t know.”
“Then why are you afraid I’ll open it?”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“You see secrets everywhere.”
“That’s because people keep lying to me.”
She didn’t answer.
Daniel and I went downstairs.
The wine cellar occupied the oldest section of the estate.
Stone walls.
Low arches.
Original foundation.
Daniel removed two wooden shelves from the far wall.
Behind them was a narrow service panel I had never noticed.
No handle.
No visible lock.
Only a steel plate.
Daniel scanned it.
“Electronic.”
“How old?”
“New.”
That was impossible.
The surrounding wall looked original.
But somebody had installed a modern access system inside it.
Daniel connected a diagnostic tool.
“Encrypted.”
“Can you open it?”
“Eventually.”
“How long?”
“An hour.”
“You have ten minutes.”
Nine minutes later, the lock released.
The stone section moved inward without a sound.
Cold air touched my face.
Behind the wall was a narrow staircase descending underground.
New lights ran along the ceiling.
Someone had maintained this place.
Recently.
Daniel whispered something unpleasant.
I stepped forward.
Then I noticed an object on the first stair.
A small blue thread.
I picked it up.
Nico’s pajamas were navy blue.
Covered in tiny embroidered bears.
One of the bears on his sleeve had been ripped when he arrived Friday.
I had seen Elena sewing it at my kitchen table.
The thread in my hand was the same color.
Luca and Nico had not been taken through a window.
Nobody had crossed my walls.
Nobody had opened the front gate.
My nephews had walked beneath my house.
I turned toward Elena, who had followed us into the cellar.
She was staring at the open passage.
Her face was pale.
“You knew this was here,” I said.
“No.”
“Elena.”
“I didn’t.”
“Then why do you look like you’ve seen a ghost?”
She stared into the darkness beneath my home.
Then she whispered three words that made everything worse.
“Close the door.”
I stepped toward her.
“Why?”
“Because if they used that tunnel…”
She stopped.
“If they used it, what?”
Her eyes met mine.
And for the first time since the boys disappeared, my sister looked less afraid for them than she was afraid of what I might find by following them.
“I said close it, Vincent.”
I stared down the illuminated staircase.
“No.”
May you like
Then I started walking.
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