Chapter 2 - The Man Who Already Knew Her Name
Clara stared at the photograph until the city outside the car became nothing more than streaks of white and gold.
“That’s my mother.”
“I know.”
She looked at Casey.
“You knew my mother?”
“No.”
“Then why do you have this?”
“Because someone left it in my car eleven minutes ago.”
Clara’s fingers tightened around the photograph.
The baby in her mother’s arms was wrapped in a pale blanket.
Clara.
There was no question.
Her mother had kept photographs from Clara’s childhood in a blue shoebox beneath her bed. Clara remembered the same blanket.
Her mother, Evelyn Hayes, had died four years earlier after a brief illness.
She had been thirty-eight.
Too young to die.
Too young to leave Clara raising a thirteen-year-old boy alone.
Casey sat opposite her in the spacious rear compartment.
One of his associates drove.
The other was making quiet calls from the front seat.
“Someone knew I would recognize her,” Clara whispered.
“Apparently.”
“And knew you wouldn’t.”
“Yes.”
“What does ‘Casey must never know’ mean?”
“If I knew, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
She looked toward the window.
“Where are we going?”
“Your apartment.”
“You said someone might be there.”
“That’s why we aren’t stopping directly outside.”
The car turned onto Clara’s street.
Casey leaned forward.
“Lights off.”
The sedan darkened.
Clara saw her building.
Nothing looked wrong.
Owen’s bedroom light remained on.
Then she saw a man across the street.
Dark coat.
Umbrella.
Standing beneath the awning of a closed pharmacy.
Watching the building.
“That’s him.”
Casey followed her gaze.
“You recognize him?”
“No.”
Casey spoke to the driver.
“Keep moving.”
Clara grabbed his sleeve.
“My brother is in there.”
“I know.”
“We’re driving away.”
“If we stop, the man watching learns exactly what we care about.”
“He already knows!”
Casey looked at her.
“Then give me sixty seconds.”
He made a call.
“Third floor. Apartment 3C. Fourteen-year-old boy. Bring him out through the rear staircase.”
Clara stared.
“Who are you calling?”
“Someone who can reach him faster than we can.”
“You expect me to trust you?”
“No.”
The answer surprised her.
“I expect you to judge what happens next.”
Forty-three seconds later, Clara’s phone rang.
Owen.
She answered instantly.
“Where are you?”
“Some giant guy is at the door.”
Clara closed her eyes.
“Did you open it?”
“No. I’m not stupid.”
Despite everything, she almost laughed.
“Put him on.”
There was movement.
Then a deep voice.
“Ms. Hayes, my name is Vincent. Mr. Vane sent me. I am standing in the hall. I will show your brother my phone screen.”
Clara received a photograph.
Casey lifted two fingers in the car.
The photograph showed the exact gesture.
Clara swallowed.
“Okay.”
Ten minutes later, Owen climbed into a second vehicle.
The man under the pharmacy awning vanished before anyone could approach him.
Casey took Clara and Owen to a private penthouse overlooking the river.
Owen thought it was the greatest thing that had ever happened.
“Is this actually your place?”
Casey removed his coat.
“One of them.”
Owen looked at Clara.
“One of them?”
“Don’t encourage him,” Clara said.
Owen turned back to Casey.
“Are you really—”
“No,” Clara interrupted.
“I didn’t even finish.”
“I know what you were going to ask.”
Casey’s mouth almost formed a smile.
Clara noticed.
That somehow annoyed her.
A woman named Mrs. Alvarez brought Owen food and showed him to a guest room.
Clara waited until the door closed.
Then she turned on Casey.
“Now tell me what’s happening.”
“I’m still finding out.”
“You know my name, my address, my brother, and somehow my mother is connected to you.”
“I learned your address after you warned me.”
“Then how did you know Owen?”
“Public school emergency contact records aren’t difficult for people with resources.”
“That is not reassuring.”
“It wasn’t intended to be.”
Casey placed the old photograph on the counter.
“My people checked your mother.”
Clara’s expression hardened.
“She’s dead.”
“I know.”
“Then leave her alone.”
“She worked at L’Ciel.”
Clara froze.
“No.”
“For eighteen months.”
“My mother was a receptionist.”
“Before that.”
Clara slowly sat.
Casey opened a tablet.
A black-and-white employee photograph appeared.
Evelyn Hayes.
Age nineteen.
Server.
L’Ciel.
Clara felt as though the floor had shifted.
“She never told me.”
“Apparently she didn’t tell you several things.”
Clara stared at him.
“You think my mother had something to do with what happened tonight?”
“I think someone wanted me to drink from that glass, and when you stopped me, they immediately connected you to a photograph from twenty years ago.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know yet.”
His phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed.
“When?”
A pause.
“Keep him there.”
He ended the call.
“What?”
“They found Tomas.”
“The fake waiter?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Trying to leave the city.”
Clara stood.
“I want to talk to him.”
“No.”
“He looked at me after I warned you.”
“Exactly why you’re not talking to him.”
“I’m already involved.”
“You are alive. I’d like to keep the distinction.”
Clara folded her arms.
“Did you just make a joke?”
“No.”
“You almost did.”
“I’ll try not to repeat the mistake.”
Despite herself, Clara smiled.
It lasted half a second.
Then Casey’s phone chimed.
A photograph appeared.
He opened it.
His face went still.
“What now?”
Instead of answering, he turned the phone around.
A security image showed Ricard leaving L’Ciel through the employee entrance.
Time stamp: 10:21 p.m.
He carried a black leather folder.
“What is that?”
“We don’t know.”
Clara leaned closer.
Then she noticed something.
“Wait.”
She enlarged the photograph.
The folder had a gold emblem stamped into the corner.
A small circle divided by three lines.
Clara knew that symbol.
“My mother had that.”
Casey looked at her.
“What?”
“A box.”
She could suddenly picture it.
Dark wood.
Locked.
Same symbol burned into the lid.
“She kept it under her bed.”
“Where is it now?”
Clara’s heart sank.
“At my apartment.”
Thirty minutes later, they returned with security.
Nothing had been disturbed.
Owen stayed in the car.
Clara went directly to her mother’s old bedroom.
She knelt beside the bed.
Reached underneath.
Nothing.
She checked the closet.
Empty.
“The box is gone.”
Casey stood in the doorway.
“When did you last see it?”
“Years ago.”
“Before your mother died?”
“Yes.”
“Did she ever open it?”
“Not in front of me.”
Clara searched the drawers.
Nothing.
Then she noticed the back panel of the nightstand.
One screw was missing.
She pulled.
The panel slid open.
Inside was an envelope.
Her name was written across the front in her mother’s handwriting.
CLARA — ONLY IF THE MAN NAMED VANE EVER FINDS YOU.
Clara’s fingers shook.
Casey remained silent behind her.
She opened it.
Inside was a single sheet of paper.
The message was short.
Clara, if you are reading this, then I failed to keep the past buried. Do not trust the first story anyone tells you—not even Casey Vane. Find the room beneath L’Ciel before they do. The truth about your father is there.
Clara read the final line twice.
Then a third time.
Casey’s voice came quietly behind her.
“What does it say?”
Clara turned.
For the first time since meeting him, she saw something close to fear in his eyes.
She handed him the letter.
Casey read it.
His jaw tightened.
“Your father?”
Clara nodded.
“He died before I was born.”
Casey looked at her.
“Clara…”
“What?”
“My father owned L’Ciel twenty years ago.”
Silence filled the room.
Rain touched the window.
Then Casey said the sentence that changed everything.
“And according to records my people found tonight, your mother wasn’t just an employee there.”
He turned the tablet toward her.
An old photograph filled the screen.
Evelyn Hayes stood beside Casey’s father.
They were holding hands.
And between them, almost hidden beneath the picture’s torn edge, was a handwritten note.
May you like
If Evelyn’s child survives, everything belongs to her.
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