Chapter 4 - What Noah Remembered
The name was mine.
Not Daniel.
My full name.
Underneath it was a date.
Eight years earlier.
And beneath that:
He knows what happened.
I couldn't breathe.
Derek took the notebook from the officer.
“What is this?”
“I don't know.”
But I did.
Or at least I knew what it could mean.
Eight years ago, before Lena and I married, I worked with Evan Cole.
We ran a small construction company.
One of our storage properties had burned down.
The official report called it an electrical accident.
Evan blamed faulty wiring.
I had never believed him.
But there had never been enough evidence to prove anything else.
A month after the fire, Evan disappeared from the company.
I never saw him again.
Until the photograph.
“Why would Lena have this?”
Derek asked.
“I don't know.”
The officer looked at me.
“Was there anything unusual about that fire?”
I hesitated.
“Yes.”
“What?”
“One of our employees disappeared that night.”
The room became quiet.
“What was his name?”
“Marcus Reed.”
The officer wrote it down.
Then Noah spoke.
“Daddy.”
I turned.
“Yeah?”
“Mommy talked to that man.”
“What man?”
“The man in the picture.”
Evan.
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
My stomach dropped.
“Did you see him?”
Noah nodded.
“Where?”
“Outside.”
“Did he talk to Mommy?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
Noah frowned.
“I don't remember.”
I didn't push him.
He was four.
He had already endured enough.
But then he remembered something.
“He gave Mommy a box.”
“What kind of box?”
“A little black one.”
I looked at Derek.
The same color as the memory card from the video?
No.
That was impossible.
Then I remembered Lena's text.
Don't trust Travis.
Not Evan.
Travis.
Why?
The officer asked me to explain my relationship with Lena.
I told him everything.
We had separated because we'd been fighting constantly.
Not because of another person.
Not because of abuse.
Because after Noah was born, Lena became increasingly secretive.
She began missing appointments.
Taking calls outside.
Leaving the room whenever I entered.
I thought she was unhappy with me.
Maybe she had been afraid.
The officer asked about Travis.
I told him what little I knew.
He met Lena at a restaurant.
Within weeks, he was around Noah.
I objected.
Lena told me Travis was harmless.
Then I met him.
He was charming.
Polite.
Almost too polite.
I remembered the first time he shook my hand.
He had looked directly into my eyes and said:
“Lena deserves someone who doesn't make her afraid.”
At the time, I thought he was insulting me.
Now I wondered if he had been warning me.
The officer left to speak with another detective.
Derek sat beside me.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Good.”
I looked at him.
He sighed.
“I mean, you shouldn't be okay.”
I almost smiled.
Then Noah shifted beside me.
His eyes were closed.
He was falling asleep.
I carried him to the couch.
Derek covered him with a blanket.
Then my phone vibrated.
Another message.
This time from Lena.
Go to the warehouse.
I stared at it.
A second message arrived.
But don't go alone.
Then a third.
Travis knows about the room underneath it.
I looked at Derek.
“What room?”
He frowned.
“What?”
I showed him.
He stared at the screen.
“The warehouse had a basement?”
“I never knew about one.”
Derek stood.
The detective returned.
I showed him the messages.
He immediately took my phone.
“We're going to verify where these are coming from.”
“What about the warehouse?”
“You are not going anywhere.”
“But Lena—”
“If she's alive, we find her safely.”
Then Noah woke.
His eyes were barely open.
He looked at me.
“Daddy?”
“I'm here.”
“Mommy said something.”
“What?”
“She said if Uncle Derek came…”
He stopped.
I waited.
“What did she say?”
Noah looked toward Derek.
“She said Uncle Derek would know where the secret door was.”
Derek froze.
I stared at him.
“What secret door?”
Derek didn't answer.
“Derek?”
He looked at the floor.
Then he whispered:
“There was never supposed to be a secret door.”
The detective immediately turned toward him.
“What does that mean?”
May you like
Derek looked at me.
And for the first time since I had known my brother, I saw fear in his eyes...
