Chapter 6 - Clara’s Secret Two-Year Gap
Elena had known she was in danger.
That knowledge was worse than ignorance.
I read the letter twice before I understood the words.
Then a third time because I didn't want to.
She described months of strange symptoms.
Dizziness.
Brief confusion.
Heart palpitations.
Weakness that appeared and vanished.
At first, doctors blamed stress.
Then Dr. Samuel Hayes found something abnormal in her bloodwork.
Tiny traces of a compound that should not have been there.
Not enough to kill her.
Enough to make her sick.
Repeated exposure could have become fatal.
Someone had been poisoning my wife.
Slowly.
Carefully.
Inside our home.
The letter continued.
Samuel believed whoever was doing it had access to Elena's food or medication.
He advised her to tell me.
She refused.
That cut deeply.
Her reason cut deeper.
Vincent, I knew what you would do. You would lock down the estate, interrogate everyone, and possibly start a war before we knew who was responsible. I needed proof before I put Matteo in the middle of that.
I stopped reading.
Clara watched me.
“She knew you,” she said quietly.
I almost snapped at her.
Then I realized Elena had predicted exactly what I would have done.
The medical records confirmed Samuel's findings.
Clara turned pages.
“This compound can cause neurological and cardiac symptoms.”
“You know it?”
“My sister was tested for environmental toxins during her illness.”
I looked at her.
“Because of your father?”
She nodded slowly.
“After he disappeared, I found notebooks.”
“What notebooks?”
“He kept records on patients outside the hospital system.”
“Why?”
“I thought paranoia.”
“And now?”
Clara swallowed.
“Maybe he was protecting evidence.”
The flash drive was encrypted.
Dominic took it.
“I'll get someone on it.”
“No outside technicians.”
“Then it could take longer.”
“I don't care.”
Clara pointed to one photograph inside the box.
“Elena knew my father was frightened.”
The image showed Samuel Hayes leaving a medical building.
Behind him was a black sedan.
A man stood beside it.
Face turned away.
Silver bird embroidered on his jacket.
The same symbol Matteo remembered.
Dominic's expression hardened.
“This keeps coming back.”
“Find the symbol,” I said.
He photographed it.
Clara remained strangely quiet.
“What aren't you telling me?”
She closed her eyes.
“My sister used to draw that bird.”
I stared.
“What?”
“After she got sick.”
“When she was confused?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I never knew.”
Clara sat.
“When she first woke from one of the worst episodes, she kept drawing a bird with silver wings.”
“What did she say?”
“Nothing coherent.”
I leaned closer.
“Clara.”
“She kept saying, ‘The bird watches medicine.’”
Dominic and I exchanged a look.
“Where is your sister now?”
Clara hesitated.
“Maine.”
“Name?”
“Rebecca.”
“Can we speak to her?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because she doesn't remember most of that year.”
“Doesn't mean she remembers nothing.”
Clara stood abruptly.
“You are not dragging her into your world.”
“She may already be in it.”
“No.”
“If your father treated Elena and your sister was affected by the same people—”
“You don't know that.”
“And neither do you.”
For the first time, Clara looked vulnerable rather than combative.
“My sister almost died.”
“So did my son.”
“That doesn't give you ownership of everyone's trauma.”
The sentence hit hard.
I stepped back.
She was right.
Again.
I was growing tired of that.
We returned to the mansion shortly after sunrise.
Matteo was awake.
He had demanded breakfast in the garden.
That alone would have been unimaginable a week earlier.
I joined him.
He was holding a pancake.
“Where were you?”
“Working.”
“You were gone.”
“Yes.”
“You didn't tell me.”
I sat.
“You're right.”
Clara appeared behind me.
Matteo looked at her.
“You went too?”
“Yes.”
“You both lie badly.”
I almost smiled.
“Apparently.”
He studied us.
“Did you find something about Mom?”
My instinct was to protect him.
To say no.
To hide the terrible details.
Then Clara's earlier words returned.
Respect him.
Not pity.
“Yes,” I said.
Matteo placed down his fork.
“What?”
“Your mom thought someone was trying to hurt her before the car exploded.”
His face went pale.
Clara sat beside him.
“She was trying to figure out who.”
“Did she?”
“Not completely.”
Matteo whispered, “Was she scared?”
I thought of Elena writing that letter alone.
“Yes.”
He looked toward the ocean.
“She never looked scared.”
“That was your mother.”
A tiny smile appeared.
“She yelled at you a lot.”
Clara coughed to hide laughter.
I stared at her.
Matteo smiled wider.
“She did.”
It was the first time we had spoken about Elena without the conversation collapsing into silence.
For ten minutes, she was alive again.
Her terrible singing.
Her obsession with labeling leftovers.
The way she stole my shirts.
How she once threatened a contractor with a garden shovel because he cut down the wrong rose bush.
Matteo laughed until tears came.
This time they weren't only sad.
That afternoon, Dominic entered my office.
“We identified the silver bird.”
He placed a file down.
“Private security contractor called Argent Wing.”
I knew the name.
“Who owns it?”
“Officially? Shell companies.”
“Unofficially?”
Dominic hesitated.
“Your cousin Luca invested in them five years ago.”
My jaw tightened.
Then Dominic added something worse.
“There's another investor.”
“Who?”
He slid a document toward me.
Samuel Hayes.
May you like
Clara's father.
And suddenly the two families were connected far more deeply than any of us had understood.
Related Stories
