Chapter 8 - A Voice from Fifteen Years Ago
Marlowe Storage had been abandoned for eleven years.
Broken windows.
Faded brick.
A rusted sign with half the letters missing.
Daniel parked two blocks away.
“No lights.”
“Good.”
“Could mean nobody’s here.”
“Or everyone’s hiding.”
We entered through a side door Clara had described.
Inside, the building smelled of old concrete and river water.
Dust covered the floor.
Recent footprints cut through it.
Daniel crouched.
“Several people.”
“How recent?”
“Last twenty-four hours.”
We followed them.
The warehouse opened into a large central floor.
Near the far wall, a section of concrete had been disturbed.
A steel hatch.
Exactly as Clara said.
It stood open.
I started toward it.
Daniel caught my arm.
“Wait.”
I looked at him.
“If Raymond set this up—”
“My brother is down there.”
“And rushing in helps him how?”
I hated that he was right.
Daniel checked the stairwell first.
Empty.
We descended.
Twenty steps.
Thirty.
At the bottom was a corridor far newer than the building above.
Concrete walls.
Emergency lighting.
A hidden facility.
“What was this place?” I whispered.
“Records storage,” Daniel said. “Raymond built off-site archives beneath properties nobody would notice.”
We passed three empty rooms.
In the fourth, I found blood—
No.
Not blood.
A spilled cup of dark coffee had dried across a desk.
For some reason the ordinary detail disturbed me more.
Someone had been here recently enough to drink it.
A laptop sat open.
Screen black.
Beside it was a tape recorder.
Old-fashioned.
I pressed play.
Static.
Then a voice.
My voice.
Fifteen years younger.
“Michael, I’m telling you, leave it alone.”
I stopped breathing.
The recording continued.
Michael laughed.
“You say that every time I find something interesting.”
“This isn’t interesting. It’s dangerous.”
“So you believe me.”
“I believe you’re irritating enough to create danger where none existed.”
“That’s practically affection from you.”
My hand tightened around the recorder.
I remembered the conversation.
Not where we had it.
Not why anyone had recorded it.
But I remembered Michael’s laugh.
The tape clicked.
Then another recording began.
Raymond Sloane.
“You’ve collected things that don’t belong to you.”
Michael answered.
“Funny. I was going to say the same.”
“Your father understands how the world works.”
“My father understands fear.”
“You should learn from him.”
“I learned enough.”
“You think Vincent will protect you?”
“He’ll try.”
“He won’t even know where to look.”
Michael’s voice became quieter.
“He will eventually.”
The recording ended.
I stood frozen.
Daniel searched the desk.
“This is evidence.”
“It’s a message.”
“For who?”
“Me.”
Michael had known I would come.
Maybe not when.
But eventually.
We found more recordings.
Financial conversations.
Threats.
Names.
Raymond’s voice repeatedly.
Enough to destroy him.
Why hadn’t Michael released them fifteen years ago?
Then Daniel found the answer.
A notebook.
Michael’s handwriting.
The final page was dated two days earlier.
Raymond never worked alone.
Below it were four names.
Three I didn’t recognize.
One I did.
Anthony Mercer.
My father’s attorney.
The man who handled Michael’s death certificate.
My father’s estate.
My purchase of the house.
Every legal transfer after our father died.
Anthony had eaten Christmas dinner with us.
He had carried my mother’s coffin.
I stared at his name.
“Mercer is involved.”
Daniel looked over my shoulder.
“That explains the records.”
“What records?”
“Michael’s death certificate. Property transfers. Everything that made the staged death official.”
A sound came from deeper in the corridor.
Metal scraping.
We froze.
Another sound.
Daniel raised a flashlight.
“Stay behind me.”
“No.”
“Vincent—”
“My brother.”
I moved first.
The corridor ended at another steel door.
Locked.
From the other side came three knocks.
Pause.
Two knocks.
Pause.
Three.
I knew that rhythm.
Michael and I used it as children when we passed notes through bedroom walls.
I stepped closer.
“Michael?”
Silence.
Then:
Three.
Two.
Three.
My hands began shaking.
“Michael!”
A weak voice answered.
“You still shout too much.”
I closed my eyes.
Fifteen years disappeared.
He was alive.
Not a photograph.
Not a letter.
Not Clara’s story.
Alive.
“Open this door!” I yelled.
Daniel inspected the lock.
“Manual release is damaged.”
“How long?”
“Give me five minutes.”
“You have two.”
From behind the door, Michael laughed faintly.
“Still bossy.”
I pressed my hand against the metal.
“You don’t get to joke.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Fair.”
“What happened?”
“Door locked automatically.”
“Are you hurt?”
“Mostly my pride.”
That sounded like Michael.
I lowered my forehead against the door.
“You’re really there.”
A pause.
“Yes.”
“Fifteen years.”
“I know.”
“I buried you.”
“I know.”
“You let me.”
Silence.
“Vincent.”
“No. Don’t Vincent me.”
Daniel worked faster.
“I thought you were dead.”
“I know.”
“Mom thought you were dead.”
His voice changed.
“I know.”
“She died believing it.”
“I know.”
For the first time, Michael sounded broken.
And immediately, my anger collided with fifteen years of grief.
I wanted to hit him.
I wanted to hug him.
I wanted to open the door and make sure he was real.
“Clara is safe,” I said.
Nothing from the other side.
Then I heard him exhale.
“Thank God.”
“She’s at my house.”
“That might not be safe.”
“I shut everything down.”
“Raymond knows?”
“Probably.”
“Then we don’t have much time.”
Daniel removed the damaged lock plate.
“What were you doing down here?”
Michael answered.
“Getting the only copy of something Raymond can’t afford to let you see.”
“What?”
“Proof.”
“Of what?”
“That my death wasn’t his biggest secret.”
The door released.
It opened slowly.
A man stood behind it.
Older than the brother in my memories.
Gray beginning at his temples.
Beard.
Tired eyes.
A scar along his jaw I had never seen.
But it was him.
Michael.
He smiled.
“Hey, Vince.”
I hit him.
Not hard.
Just once in the shoulder.
He stumbled backward.
“That’s fair.”
Then I grabbed him.
He grabbed me back.
Neither of us said anything.
We didn’t need to.
For fifteen years, I had believed there were no second chances with the dead.
I was wrong.
But as I held my brother in the underground room where he had almost vanished again, he whispered something against my shoulder.
“We have to leave.”
“Why?”
“Because Raymond knows Clara went to you.”
“I know.”
“No.”
Michael pulled back.
“You don’t understand.”
He looked at Daniel.
Then at me.
“Clara isn’t what Raymond has been protecting himself from.”
I frowned.
“Then what is?”
Michael lifted a small metal case.
“What’s inside this.”
And above us, somewhere inside the abandoned warehouse, a door slammed.
May you like
We were no longer alone.
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