Chapter 4 - A Dead Woman’s Account
David stared at Mary.
“Who knew where you were?”
“No one.”
“Someone delivered the map to my house.”
“I didn’t even know which house you lived in.”
The words cut deeper than he expected.
They had moved six months after Mary vanished. Leo could no longer sleep in the bedroom where she had kissed him goodnight.
Sloane’s voice returned.
“Four minutes.”
David opened the notebook and searched for anything that might help.
A name was written repeatedly beside several payment entries.
C. Mercer.
Colin.
David’s friend had asked about the map. He had reacted before David told him what it contained.
“No,” David whispered.
Mary saw the page.
“Who is C. Mercer?”
“My supervisor.”
“Did he know where you lived?”
“He helped us move.”
A heavy impact struck one of the security shutters.
Sloane’s men were entering.
Mary took the red box.
“We can’t stay here.”
Every public entrance was sealed, but David remembered the maintenance plans from a repair job years earlier. The terminal’s heating system connected to a service garage beneath the western platform.
He led them through the ticket office and down a stairwell.
As they descended, David used Rafi’s phone to call Elena Ruiz.
A woman answered after one ring.
“Who is this?”
“Rafi gave me your number.”
Silence.
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know. My name is David Hale.”
Another silence followed.
This one lasted longer.
“Mary Hale’s husband?”
“She’s alive.”
Elena’s breathing changed.
“Do not say anything else on this call.”
“We have evidence against Victor Sloane.”
“Where are you?”
“Central Terminal.”
“You need to leave immediately.”
“The doors are sealed.”
“Western boiler room. There is an emergency outlet through the fuel delivery tunnel.”
David stopped.
“How did you know that?”
“Because I spent nine months investigating that building before the department removed me from the case.”
A crash echoed above.
Mary took the phone.
“Elena?”
“Mary.”
“You knew I was alive?”
“I hoped.”
“You stopped looking.”
“I was suspended after I requested search warrants for Armitage properties. Vance buried the investigation.”
Mary leaned against the wall.
“Can we trust you?”
“No,” Elena said. “Trust evidence. Meet me at Saint Orla’s Church in one hour. Come through the cemetery entrance. If I’m not alone, keep walking.”
The call ended.
They entered the boiler room.
Dust covered the machinery. David found the fuel tunnel behind a rolling steel door and used an old wrench to release the lock.
A siren sounded.
Sloane’s men had reached the lower level.
David lifted Leo and hurried into the tunnel. Mary carried the phone and the red box beneath her coat.
They emerged behind the terminal into an alley filled with construction barriers.
A taxi passed at the end of the street.
David stepped into the road and forced it to stop.
The driver shouted until he saw Leo and Mary.
Then he unlocked the doors.
They asked to be taken near Saint Orla’s, but David told the driver to change direction three times. He searched the mirrors for black vehicles.
Mary sat beside Leo in the back seat.
The boy had not released her hand.
“Are you coming home now?” he asked.
Mary’s face tightened.
“Yes.”
The certainty in her answer surprised David.
Leo leaned against her.
“Forever?”
Mary kissed the top of his head.
“I will spend every day trying.”
They left the taxi six blocks from the church and walked through narrow residential streets.
Saint Orla’s had been abandoned after a fire damaged part of its roof. The cemetery behind it was overgrown with tall grass and leaning stones.
Elena Ruiz waited beside a stone angel.
She wore a dark coat and held both hands where they could see them.
She was in her early forties, with black hair cut at her jaw and an old scar above her left eyebrow.
Mary stopped twenty feet away.
Elena’s expression softened.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For believing the department when they told me you had driven into the river.”
“You didn’t believe them.”
“No. But I failed to prove they were lying.”
David placed the red box on a stone bench.
Elena examined the photograph and notebook.
When she saw the unlocked phone, her eyes widened.
“This may be enough to reopen every missing-person case connected to Armitage.”
“May be?” David asked.
“The records prove illegal payments, but Sloane’s attorneys will claim they were fabricated. We need an authenticated source and an independent release.”
“Mary is the source.”
“And Mary is legally dead.”
Mary looked at her.
“Can you change that?”
“Not before they arrest you for stealing confidential records or place you in psychiatric detention.”
David stepped closer.
“She was kidnapped.”
“By people who control which reports become official.”
Elena opened one of the phone’s folders.
A list of names appeared.
Some were marked transferred. Others were marked closed.
One word appeared beside Mary Hale.
Recovered.
David felt sick.
Elena scrolled farther.
“There are seventy-three names.”
Mary looked over her shoulder.
“I knew there were others.”
“Not this many.”
A church bell rang once, though the abandoned building had no electricity.
Elena immediately closed the phone.
“We’re being watched.”
A light flashed from a building across the street.
David looked toward the cemetery gate.
A familiar figure stood outside it.
Colin Mercer.
May you like
He stared at David for one long moment.
Then he turned and disappeared.
