Chapter 2 - Two Men Were Waiting Outside Her Door
Lily didn’t remember sitting down.
One moment she was standing beside Damian.
The next she was in the chair near the window, staring at the photograph in her hands.
Eleven years younger.
A different camera.
A different life.
And beside her—
Evan.
Her brother.
“No.”
The word came out quietly.
Damian stood across from her.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t.”
Lily looked up sharply.
“Don’t say you’re sorry when you don’t know what happened.”
“Then tell me.”
She almost laughed.
“You’re very comfortable demanding answers.”
“Tonight, answers are keeping you alive.”
That silenced her.
Lily looked at the photograph again.
Eleven years ago she had been nineteen.
Evan had been twenty-seven.
He had been everything she thought adulthood should be—fearless, funny, impossible to intimidate.
He had also been an investigative journalist.
Then one night his car went through a guardrail.
Police recovered the vehicle from a river.
They never recovered Evan.
He had been declared dead months later.
Lily had spent years believing the river had simply refused to return him.
“What was he investigating?” Damian asked.
“I never knew.”
“That isn’t true.”
She looked up.
“You don’t know me.”
“No. But I know the difference between ignorance and something someone has trained themselves not to remember.”
That irritated her because it was close enough to truth.
Lily stood.
“The night before Evan disappeared, he gave me a camera.”
Damian waited.
“He told me to photograph everything.”
“Everything where?”
“A fundraiser.”
“For whom?”
Lily looked at him.
“I didn’t know then.”
“And now?”
She swallowed.
“Marcus Voss.”
Silence.
Damian’s expression became unreadable.
“You photographed Voss eleven years ago?”
“Yes.”
“Do you still have those photographs?”
“No.”
That was a lie.
Damian knew.
Lily knew he knew.
But he didn’t challenge her.
Not yet.
Instead he said, “You’re coming with me.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere Marcus doesn’t control.”
“And you do?”
“Yes.”
The simplicity of the answer was almost worse.
Twenty minutes later, they left through a service corridor.
Adrian went first.
Lily stayed between him and Damian.
The hotel kitchen was nearly empty.
They crossed loading areas and entered an underground garage.
A black SUV waited.
Lily stopped.
“This feels like every bad decision a woman is warned not to make.”
Damian opened the rear door.
“You can stay.”
“And Marcus?”
“Will find you.”
She climbed inside.
They drove for forty minutes.
Nobody spoke.
Lily watched reflections move across Damian’s face.
Eventually the skyline disappeared.
They entered a quieter neighborhood and stopped outside an unremarkable brick building.
Inside was nothing unremarkable.
Security doors.
Cameras.
Armed men.
Damian led Lily upstairs to an apartment.
“You live here?”
“No.”
“Then whose place is it?”
“Tonight? Yours.”
She turned.
“I’m not staying alone.”
“You won’t be.”
Damian removed his jacket and placed it over a chair.
“I’ll be downstairs.”
For some reason, that bothered her.
“You trust me alone up here?”
“No.”
“Good.”
He almost smiled.
Then Adrian entered.
His expression killed whatever softness had briefly appeared.
“We found the men from the hotel.”
Damian straightened.
“And?”
“One is dead.”
Lily froze.
“The other?”
“Missing.”
“Who killed him?”
Adrian looked toward Lily.
“We don’t know.”
Damian’s jaw tightened.
“What else?”
Adrian handed him a phone.
Damian looked at the screen.
Then at Lily.
“What?”
Damian gave her the phone.
A message filled the display.
MIDNIGHT TOMORROW. BRING THE CARD AND LILY. COME ALONE.
Below it was a photograph.
Lily stared.
A man sat tied to a chair.
Older now.
Gray at his temples.
Thinner.
But unmistakable.
Evan.
Her brother.
Alive.
Lily’s knees nearly gave out.
And beneath the photograph was another sentence.
ASK DAMIAN WHY HE KNEW EVAN WAS ALIVE.
Lily slowly lifted her eyes.
Damian had gone completely still.
That was when she understood.
The message wasn’t only threatening them.
It was exposing him.
“You knew,” Lily whispered.
Damian said nothing.
Her voice broke.
May you like
“You knew my brother was alive.”
And the silence on Damian’s face told her everything.
Related Stories
