Chapter 3 - The Woman Who Knew Too Much

Alejandro stared at the stone wall long after Isabella’s voice vanished.

Valeria touched his arm.

“Did that sound like her?”

“Yes.”

“You’re sure?”

“I heard that voice every day for eight years.”

Mateo wiped his face against Valeria’s shoulder.

“Mommy sad.”

Alejandro crouched beside him.

“Mateo, when did you last see her?”

The boy looked down.

“Tuesday.”

It was Friday.

Alejandro closed his eyes.

“Three days ago.”

Valeria pointed at the red beam.

“We still have an alarm between us and the gate cottage.”

Alejandro took a silver cigarette case from his pocket.

“You smoke?”

“No.”

“Then why carry that?”

“It isn’t a cigarette case.”

He opened it.

Inside were lock picks, a tiny ceramic blade, and a folding mirror.

Valeria raised an eyebrow.

“You carry burglary tools to breakfast?”

“I have enemies.”

“You also own the house.”

“Those facts are not mutually exclusive.”

He placed the mirror low to the floor and angled it toward the beam.

A small black sensor was fixed inside a crack in the stone.

“Pressure relay,” he said.

“Can you disable it?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“By not touching it.”

“That’s not disabling it.”

“It is when the only purpose is to tell someone we passed.”

He looked up at the ceiling.

“There.”

A cable ran between two beams.

Alejandro used the ceramic blade to strip the outer coating, then separated one wire.

The red beam flickered out.

“You know security systems,” Valeria said.

“I know how people try to kill me.”

Mateo whispered, “Daddy bad job.”

Alejandro looked at his son.

For a moment, Valeria thought he would correct him.

Instead he said, “Yes.”

The passage ended behind a wardrobe in the old gate cottage.

Margaret Finch was waiting with a cast-iron frying pan raised over her shoulder.

When Alejandro stepped through, she almost hit him.

“Good Lord.”

“Put that down.”

“You enter my bedroom through a wall and tell me what to do?”

Mrs. Finch was sixty-three, broad-shouldered, gray-haired, and unimpressed by money.

Then she saw Mateo.

Her expression changed.

“Oh, sweetheart.”

Mateo reached for her.

Valeria handed him over.

Mrs. Finch held him close.

Alejandro immediately asked, “Did Isabella call this cottage?”

The older woman’s face drained.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You do.”

“No.”

“I heard her voice through the passage.”

Mrs. Finch looked at Valeria.

Valeria said, “He heard what I heard.”

Mrs. Finch’s grip tightened around Mateo.

“Alejandro, you need to leave.”

“No.”

“You need to take your boy and leave the country.”

“My wife is alive.”

Mrs. Finch flinched.

That was enough.

Alejandro stepped closer.

“You knew.”

“I knew something.”

“How long?”

“Not what you think.”

“How long?”

“A year.”

Alejandro’s voice dropped.

“My wife disappeared two years ago.”

“I did not know she was alive until last winter.”

“And you said nothing?”

“Because the first time I tried, someone put my grandson in hospital.”

Valeria went still.

Mrs. Finch looked at her.

“He lives in Leeds. He is a schoolteacher. No enemies, no debts. One night a van ran him off the road after I told Mr. Shaw I wanted to speak privately with Alejandro.”

Alejandro’s jaw tightened.

“Why did you tell Shaw?”

“Because for twelve years he was the man who arranged access to you.”

“That does not explain why you stayed silent after.”

“They sent me a photograph of my grandson asleep in his hospital room.”

Mateo buried his face against her shoulder.

Mrs. Finch’s voice cracked.

“Under the photograph they wrote, ‘One warning.’”

Alejandro looked away.

Valeria said, “What did you learn last winter?”

Mrs. Finch handed Mateo back to her and went to a small writing desk.

From beneath a drawer, she removed a folded grocery receipt.

On the back were handwritten dates.

“Every second Thursday, Dr. Cole ordered food that made no sense.”

Alejandro looked at the list.

“Pureed vegetable soup, protein powder, electrolyte solution.”

“And enough for one extra adult,” Mrs. Finch said. “At first I thought he had a patient somewhere. Then I noticed he always collected the tray himself.”

“North wing?”

“I followed him once.”

Alejandro’s eyes hardened.

“You entered the passage?”

“This house has more secrets than bedrooms. I worked here before you bought it.”

“What did you see?”

“Cole carrying the tray through Room Two.”

“Room Two is empty.”

“Not anymore.”

Mrs. Finch pulled another paper from the desk.

A rough pencil map.

“The visible door to Room Four is a decoy. The real room sits behind the old nursery wall.”

Valeria leaned over the drawing.

“Then what does Mateo’s key open?”

Mrs. Finch looked at the child.

“That I don’t know.”

Mateo whispered, “Blue door.”

Alejandro knelt.

“What blue door?”

“Behind wardrobe.”

Mrs. Finch stared.

“There was a blue service door behind Isabella’s dressing wardrobe.”

Alejandro looked at her.

“You knew that?”

“I knew the door existed. It was sealed decades ago.”

Mateo shook his head.

“Not sealed.”

Valeria said, “Nothing in this house is as sealed as people claim.”

Mrs. Finch gave a humorless laugh.

“You’ve learned quickly.”

Alejandro tapped the dates.

“Why did Isabella call here just now?”

Mrs. Finch pointed to an old cream telephone on the bedside table.

“She didn’t.”

“That phone rang.”

“It hasn’t worked in six years.”

Alejandro crossed to it and lifted the receiver.

No dial tone.

He unscrewed the base.

Inside, a newer wire had been spliced into the old cable.

“This is connected to the internal service line.”

Mrs. Finch looked shocked.

“I never knew.”

Valeria said, “Maybe Isabella found a way to call through the old system.”

“Or someone played a recording,” Alejandro said.

Mateo immediately shook his head.

“Mommy.”

“I believe you,” Valeria told him.

Alejandro looked at the map.

“Show me the safest way back to the north wing.”

Mrs. Finch took a step backward.

“No.”

“I am not asking.”

“And I am not one of your soldiers.”

“My wife is imprisoned in that house.”

“Which means whoever did it has survived two years under your roof. You rush in angry, you get her killed.”

Valeria looked at Alejandro.

“She is right.”

He gave her a tired look.

“You say that often.”

“Because people around you are afraid to.”

Mrs. Finch almost smiled.

Alejandro did not.

“Then what do you suggest?”

Mrs. Finch pointed at Mateo.

“First, we find out what the boy knows without frightening him.”

Alejandro’s shoulders tightened.

“He is four.”

“Exactly. Children remember pictures, sounds, routines. Not interrogations.”

Valeria sat on the rug with Mateo.

“Can we play a game?”

Mateo eyed her suspiciously.

“What game?”

“You draw the upstairs.”

“I can’t draw house.”

“You can draw doors.”

Mrs. Finch found crayons.

Mateo chose blue.

He drew a rectangle.

Then a smaller rectangle inside it.

Then a circle.

Valeria asked, “What’s the circle?”

“Eye.”

Alejandro said, “Camera.”

Mateo nodded.

He drew a red line over the eye.

“What’s that?”

“Mommy covers.”

“With what?”

Mateo picked up a black crayon and drew a square.

“Book.”

Mrs. Finch whispered, “She blocks the camera with a book.”

Mateo drew another shape beside the door.

A tall stick figure.

“Who is that?”

“Doctor.”

He added shoes.

Then another figure.

This one had a square body.

“Who is that?”

Mateo refused to answer.

Alejandro softened his voice.

“You won’t be in trouble.”

Mateo looked at Valeria.

She said, “You can whisper.”

He leaned close.

“Uncle Ben.”

Alejandro went still.

“Shaw told you to call him Uncle Ben?”

Mateo nodded.

“How long has he been taking you upstairs?”

“Lots.”

“Does your mother speak to him?”

Mateo’s face twisted.

“She says liar.”

Mrs. Finch looked at Alejandro.

Valeria asked, “Does Mr. Shaw hurt your mommy?”

Mateo hesitated.

“No touch.”

“What does he do?”

“Talk mean.”

“What does he say?”

Mateo rubbed his fingers together.

“Where is book?”

Alejandro frowned.

“What book?”

Mateo pointed to his drawing of the camera.

“The black book?”

“No. Mommy book.”

“Does she have a book hidden somewhere?”

Mateo nodded.

“Where?”

He suddenly clapped both hands over his mouth.

Valeria stopped.

“You don’t have to tell us.”

Mateo’s eyes filled.

“Mommy said never tell Daddy.”

Alejandro looked as if he had been struck.

“Why?”

Mateo whispered, “Because Daddy would burn world.”

No one spoke.

Mrs. Finch finally said, “That sounds like Isabella.”

Alejandro stared at the floor.

Valeria watched him.

“Would you?”

He looked up.

“Would I what?”

“Burn the world.”

“If someone had my wife in a room for two years?”

“Yes.”

He did not answer.

That was answer enough.

Valeria turned back to Mateo.

“Your mommy was trying to protect your daddy from doing something dangerous.”

The boy nodded.

Alejandro’s voice was quiet.

“And I thought she left me.”

Mrs. Finch sat across from him.

“You thought that because Shaw made you think it.”

Alejandro looked at her sharply.

“What do you know about her disappearance?”

“Only what I heard.”

“From whom?”

“Isabella.”

He stood so fast the chair behind him tipped.

“You spoke to her?”

“Once.”

“When?”

“Seven months ago.”

Alejandro’s face went cold.

“You will tell me every word.”

Mrs. Finch did not look away.

“She found me in the passage at two in the morning. Barefoot. Thin. Barely able to stand. She had maybe thirty seconds before Cole came looking.”

“What did she say?”

Mrs. Finch swallowed.

“She said, ‘Tell Alejandro the crash was for him.’”

Alejandro’s face changed.

Valeria felt a chill.

Mrs. Finch continued.

“She said, ‘Benedict switched the cars. I was supposed to die because I saw the ledger. Alejandro was supposed to believe I betrayed him. Do not tell him until Mateo is safe.’”

Alejandro’s hands shook.

“What ledger?”

“I don’t know.”

Mateo looked at Valeria.

“Mommy book.”

Alejandro turned to his son.

“The ledger is the book?”

Mateo nodded.

“Where is it?”

The child looked terrified.

Valeria said, “Don’t push.”

Alejandro closed his eyes.

When he opened them, he forced himself to sit.

“All right.”

Mrs. Finch handed him the map.

“There is something else.”

“What?”

“The night I saw Isabella, she had a hospital wristband.”

Alejandro stared at her.

“What name?”

“Not Isabella.”

“What name?”

Mrs. Finch reached into the desk again and removed a small torn piece of plastic.

Printed on it were three words.

EVELYN MARSH, ROOM 4.

Valeria looked at Alejandro.

“An alias.”

He turned the band over.

On the back was a private clinic code.

His expression darkened.

“I know this clinic.”

“Where?”

“It closed three years ago.”

Mrs. Finch shook her head.

“No. Publicly it closed.”

Alejandro rose.

“How do you know?”

“My grandson’s hospital records showed a transfer consultant after his crash.”

She tapped the code.

“The consultant came from the same clinic.”

Alejandro looked toward the hidden passage.

“Shaw is not just hiding my wife. He has a medical network.”

Valeria said, “And he is using it to control witnesses.”

Mateo tugged her sleeve.

“Valeria?”

“Yes?”

“Mommy says key opens truth.”

She looked at the brass key.

“What truth?”

May you like

[COMPLETED] She waited ten years for her fiancé, but the night she marri...

[COMPLETED] Five Years After My Mafia Husband Chose Another Woman, He Me...

[COMPLETED] I CALLED MY HUSBAND 18 TIMES WHILE OUR SON WAS DYING. EIGHT...

He pointed to the bronze horse he had drawn in the corner of the page.

“The horse knows.”