Chapter 4 - The Messages With My Name
Detective Ruiz showed me a screenshot.
My name appeared at the top.
Keep her away from Lily until the party is over.
Another message followed.
Use the old room. Nobody goes in there.
I stared at the words.
“I didn’t write that.”
“Do you recognize the number?”
It was an old business line.
I had stopped using it the year Hannah disappeared.
Mark had handled the cancellation.
“Who had access?”
“Mark. Maybe Vanessa. She managed my schedule back then.”
Ruiz wrote that down.
“I’m going to need your current phone.”
I handed it over.
No speech.
No argument.
For once, being believed mattered less than giving someone the tools to find out.
Hannah was sitting up when I entered her room.
An IV ran into her arm.
She looked at my empty hands.
“Where’s the phone?”
“With Detective Ruiz.”
Her shoulders dropped a fraction.
“Good.”
I stopped beside the bed.
“I thought you left.”
“I know.”
“I looked for you.”
“I know that too.”
That hurt more than an accusation would have.
She moved the blanket away from the chair.
I sat.
For a while, neither of us spoke.
Then she said, “They showed me pictures of Lily.”
“Who?”
“Vanessa. Mark. People they paid.”
My jaw tightened.
“Where were you?”
“Different places.”
She looked toward the door.
“A house first. Then a private facility. Then another house.”
“Three years?”
Her eyes filled.
“I counted birthdays.”
I leaned forward, elbows on my knees.
The floor seemed to tilt beneath me.
Hannah touched the chain around her neck.
“They said if I contacted you, they’d take Lily. They said you’d already signed papers saying I was dangerous.”
“I never signed anything like that.”
“Not knowingly.”
She said it gently.
That made it worse.
I thought of every stack of documents Mark had slid across my desk when I was exhausted.
Every yellow tab.
Every quick explanation.
Ruiz knocked once and entered.
“We’ve located Mark’s vehicle.”
“Where?”
“Abandoned near the interstate.”
Hannah went still.
Ruiz noticed.
“What is it?”
“He won’t leave without it.”
“Without what?”
Hannah swallowed.
“The original ledger.”
I looked at her.
“What ledger?”
“The one I found before I disappeared.”
Ruiz pulled the chair closer.
“Hannah, start wherever you can.”
My wife looked at me for a long moment.
May you like
Then she said the words that turned our whole marriage into a crime scene.
“Daniel, they weren’t just taking money from your company.”
