Chapter 13 - The Room Across the Hall
I didn’t open the door.
That was the first thing Reyes had told me after the lawyer left.
If anything felt wrong, call.
Don’t investigate.
Don’t be polite.
I sent her the photograph.
Then I moved Emma away from the bed nearest the hallway.
“Are we playing?” she asked.
“Quiet game.”
“I’m good at that.”
She wasn’t.
She tried anyway.
I knelt beside her behind the curtain and kept my voice low.
“Tell me what Rabbit would say.”
She thought about it.
“He would say he’s hungry.”
“What else?”
“He doesn’t like peas.”
Footsteps stopped outside.
Someone knocked.
“Transport.”
I tightened my grip on the phone.
“We didn’t request transport.”
“Room change.”
“What’s my name?”
A pause.
Then the handle moved.
Emma stopped smiling.
My phone vibrated.
Reyes.
Stay inside. Officers coming.
The man outside knocked harder.
“Ma’am, we need to move now.”
I looked around for something heavy.
A chair.
A water pitcher.
Nothing that made me feel brave.
Emma whispered, “Mama?”
I pulled her close.
“I’m here.”
Voices rose in the hallway.
A sharp command.
The sound of someone running.
Then a crash.
Emma covered her ears.
I held her until Reyes called from the other side of the door.
She used my name.
Then Emma’s.
Then the name of the social worker who had just left.
Only then did I unlock it.
An officer had a man pressed against the far wall.
He wore hospital scrubs over dark clothes.
A visitor badge hung crookedly from his shirt.
“Who is he?” I asked.
“We’ll find out,” Reyes said.
She looked at Emma and lowered her voice.
“You did exactly the right thing.”
I didn’t feel right.
I felt furious.
At the man.
At Vittoria.
At Lorenzo.
At every adult whose choices had taught my daughter that footsteps could be frightening.
They moved us to a secured room on another floor.
Rosa arrived before dinner, carrying a grocery bag and wearing the same shoes from the night before.
She wrapped both arms around me.
“I should have spoken sooner.”
“About Daniel?”
Her face crumpled.
“About all of it.”
Reyes appeared in the doorway an hour later.
“The mechanic gave a statement. We have messages confirming who hired him.”
“Vittoria?”
“Yes.”
“And the man here?”
“He was told to get the drive he believed you still had.”
I looked down at Emma asleep against Rosa.
Reyes continued.
“We’re going to arrest Vittoria.”
Then her phone rang.
She listened.
May you like
Her expression hardened.
Vittoria had left the house before the officers arrived.
