Chapter 4 - THE MAN FROM NOWHERE
I drove away from the apartment complex slowly, my mind racing.
Who was that man? How did he know about the locket? And why did he sound so afraid that I would find out what happened seven years ago?
I pulled over to the side of the road and took out the locket again. I ran my thumb over the scratched initials. A.C. Adrian Cole. There was no mistake. This was made for me. But I had never seen it before in my life.
Unless… unless it was made by someone I had forgotten. Or someone I never knew existed.
That evening, I called Martin. He had worked for me for twelve years. He knew everything about my life—my schedule, my family, my old friends, everything that had happened in this house. If anyone knew who had been close to Elena seven years ago, it was him.
He answered on the second ring.
“Adrian, sir? Is everything alright?”
“Martin,” I said. “I need you to look into something for me. Quietly. No one else can know.”
“Of course. What is it?”
I hesitated. Then I told him everything—about the locket, the note, the date, the strange man at Vanessa’s apartment. I left out nothing.
When I finished, there was a long silence on the other end of the line.
“Martin?”
“I remember that date,” he said slowly. “Seven years ago. The week Mrs. Cole—Elena—went into the hospital.”
My blood turned to ice.
“She was never in the hospital,” I said. “She was healthy. She had a normal pregnancy. She came home and—”
“She went in for one night,” Martin said. “While you were at that business conference in Chicago. She told me not to tell you. Said it was just a routine checkup. Said she didn’t want you to worry.”
I gripped the phone until my knuckles turned white.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“She made me promise, sir. She said it was important that you didn’t know. And… she wasn’t alone. Someone brought her there. Someone met her at the hospital.”
“Who?” I demanded. “Who was it?”
Martin sighed.
“I never saw his face. He waited in the car. But I saw the license plate. And I wrote it down. Because he looked at the house… like he was memorizing it.”
My heart was pounding so hard I could barely breathe.
“Find that license plate, Martin. Please. Find out who it belongs to.”
“I already have it,” he said. “I kept the note. Just in case. I always had a bad feeling about that night.”
There was a pause. Then he said the name.
And the world tilted beneath my feet.
“The car is registered to a man named Marcus Hale.”
I sat perfectly still.
“Marcus Hale,” I repeated. “That’s the man. The one at Vanessa’s apartment today. That was him.”
“Yes sir,” Martin said quietly. “And there’s something else. Something I only found out this afternoon.”
“What?”
“Vanessa’s maiden name… it’s Hale. Vanessa Hale.”
I dropped the phone.
Vanessa and Marcus were related. Brother and sister.
Which meant they had been working together. Planning together. Waiting together.
And they had been waiting for seven years.
I picked the phone back up, my hands shaking so badly I almost dropped it again.
“Martin,” I said. “Find out everything. Everything about Marcus Hale. Everything about Vanessa. And everything about Elena’s hospital visit. I need to know what happened that night. I need to know why they’re so afraid I’ll find out.”
“I’ll have it by morning,” Martin said. “And Adrian? Be careful. If they’ve been waiting this long… they aren’t going to stop now.”
That night, I sat on the edge of Caleb’s bed and watched him sleep. His face was peaceful, his chest rising and falling slowly. He looked so much like Elena. Same eyes. Same nose. Same soft hair.
But as I looked at him, I realized something that made my stomach turn over.
If Vanessa and Marcus had been watching us for seven years… if they had known Elena… then what was the real reason Vanessa had moved into my life? Was it me she wanted? Or was it him?
I reached out and brushed the hair back from Caleb’s forehead.
*He doesn’t know yet. And he must never find out.*
The words burned in my mind.
What didn’t I know?
I leaned down and kissed Caleb’s forehead.
“I’ll protect you,” I whispered into the quiet room. “No matter what. I’ll protect you.”
Outside, down the street, a car was parked beneath the shadow of an oak tree. Two figures sat in the front seat, watching the house. And in the passenger’s hand, a phone rang once, twice, before a voice answered on the other end.
“He knows,” Vanessa said quietly into the phone. “He knows about us. And he’s starting to ask questions.”
May you like
On the other end, Marcus’s voice was low and hard.
“Then we move up the plan. Before he finds out the truth. Before he realizes exactly who Caleb really is.”
