Chapter 3 - THE MAN OUTSIDE THE STATION DOOR
Naomi switched off the desk lamp.
The abandoned office fell into darkness.
The handle moved again.
Slowly.
Not the impatient shake of an employee with the wrong key.
Someone was testing the lock.
Naomi pressed one finger to her lips and pointed toward a narrow door behind the ticket counter.
Marianne gathered her handbag and followed.
The narrow door opened into a records closet filled with empty shelves. A rusted ventilation grate hung loose near the floor.
Naomi crouched and pulled it away.
“You expect me to crawl through that?”
The office door clicked.
Someone had inserted a key.
Naomi climbed into the opening.
Marianne lowered herself to the floor and followed.
The passage was not a ventilation shaft but an old luggage conveyor tunnel. It smelled of oil and damp concrete.
Behind them, the office door opened.
A man entered.
Marianne could see only his shoes through the gap beneath the counter.
Polished black leather.
He walked directly toward the desk where they had been standing.
Naomi touched Marianne’s wrist and pulled her deeper into the tunnel.
They crawled until the passage opened behind a row of disused baggage cages.
A train announcement echoed through the main hall.
Naomi stood.
“There’s an exit near Platform 3.”
“Who was that?”
“I don’t know.”
“You told me to come here.”
“I also told you to come alone.”
“I did.”
“Then someone followed one of us.”
They moved between the cages.
Marianne’s phone remained off, but Naomi stopped near a maintenance sink.
“Open your handbag.”
Marianne held it tighter.
“Why?”
“The tracking device may not be on the phone.”
Together they emptied the contents onto a metal cart.
Wallet.
Receipts.
Keys.
Cosmetics.
A bottle of water.
The envelope containing the lottery ticket.
Naomi stared at it.
Marianne covered it with her hand.
“You said you won twenty million.”
“How did you know the amount?”
“Derek has people watching lottery claims.”
“I haven’t claimed it.”
“You checked the ticket at Keller’s Market.”
Marianne remembered sliding it under the scanner while the cashier shouted in excitement.
“The store camera.”
“And the lottery terminal sends an alert when a major ticket is verified. Derek’s group has someone inside the state commission.”
Marianne felt sick.
Naomi examined the handbag’s inner seams.
Her fingers found a small metal disc beneath the decorative logo.
She pried it loose with a key.
A green light blinked.
Marianne stared at the tracker.
“Who gave you this handbag?” Naomi asked.
“Derek.”
“When?”
“My birthday. Three months ago.”
Naomi crushed the device beneath her heel.
A metallic bang echoed from the far end of the baggage area.
They moved faster.
At Platform 3, an old commuter train waited with its doors open.
Naomi stepped aboard.
Marianne stopped.
“Where is this train going?”
“Northfield.”
“My car is here.”
“So is whoever tracked you.”
The warning tone sounded.
Marianne boarded.
The doors closed as a man in a dark raincoat entered the platform.
He walked toward the train.
Marianne moved behind a window pillar.
The man stopped beside the glass.
Detective Halpern looked directly into the carriage.
For a moment, Marianne was certain he saw her.
Then the train began to move.
Halpern lifted his phone to his ear.
Naomi watched him recede.
“You were right,” she said.
“About what?”
“They are watching you more closely than I realized.”
The train carried fewer than twenty passengers. Marianne and Naomi sat at the back.
Marianne kept the envelope inside her coat.
“What do I do with the ticket?”
“Do not claim it under your name.”
“Can Derek take it from me?”
“Not legally.”
“That did not answer my question.”
Naomi looked out at the industrial buildings passing in the rain.
“They can accuse you of being mentally incompetent. They can have you placed under emergency guardianship. They can use a forged power of attorney. They can create a tax investigation. They can even report the ticket stolen before you claim it.”
“Could they prove that?”
“They do not need to prove it immediately. They only need to freeze the money long enough to control you.”
Marianne thought of every document Derek had asked her to sign.
“Two weeks ago, he brought me papers from the hospital. He said they allowed him to make medical decisions if I became ill.”
“Did you sign?”
“Yes.”
Naomi closed her eyes.
“What?”
“Those may not have been medical directives.”
“What were they?”
“I need to see them.”
“I don’t have copies.”
“Derek does.”
Marianne looked at her.
“You want me to return to the hospital?”
“No. I want you to remember exactly where he placed them.”
“He put them in a blue folder.”
“Then what?”
“He gave the folder to Dr. Vale.”
Naomi cursed under her breath.
The train entered a tunnel.
The lights flickered.
Marianne looked at her reflection in the window.
She barely recognized the woman staring back.
For six months, fear had hollowed her face. Her hair had gone gray at the temples. She had stopped sleeping. She had stopped meeting friends. Every decision had revolved around saving Derek.
Now that mission was gone.
In its place stood a question she was afraid to ask.
“If my son is part of this,” she said, “what does he believe will happen to me after he takes everything?”
Naomi did not answer.
“Tell me.”
“He has discussed long-term care facilities.”
The words struck harder than anything Derek had said on the phone.
Marianne turned toward the window.
Rain crawled across the glass.
“Which facility?”
“Rosewood Haven.”
She knew the name.
Rosewood Haven was a private psychiatric institution outside the city.
A place where wealthy families sent relatives they did not want seen.
“My sister worked there briefly,” Naomi said. “Patients could be held for seventy-two hours under emergency evaluation. With the right signatures, seventy-two hours became thirty days.”
“And thirty days?”
“Could become permanent.”
Marianne touched the lottery ticket inside her coat.
Derek had not merely planned to steal her money.
He had planned to erase her.
The train emerged from the tunnel.
Naomi’s phone vibrated.
She read the screen, and fear transformed her face.
“What happened?”
Naomi turned the phone toward Marianne.
A photograph showed Marianne’s house from across the street.
The front door stood open.
A man was being wheeled out beneath a white sheet.
Below the image was a message.
May you like
You should have stayed home, Mrs. Cole.
Now the police will want to know why there is a dead man in your kitchen.
