Chapter 4 - THE NIGHT ELENA DISAPPEAREDMargaret refused to speak until Vincent arranged a private room and had Daniel check the hallway.
She sat across from us with both hands wrapped around a paper cup of water.
“Four years ago, Elena came to Lakeview Women's Medical Center for a routine appointment,” she began. “She was frightened, but she was also happy. She had just learned she was pregnant.”
Vincent's eyes remained fixed on her.
“Why didn't she call me?”
“She tried. Several times. Someone kept telling her you were unavailable.”
“I was never unavailable to her.”
“I believe you.”
Margaret opened her handbag and removed a small notebook.
“Elena told me she had discovered that someone had been using your name to authorize financial transfers. She thought it was an accounting problem. Then she learned that documents had been filed suggesting you were preparing to divorce her.”
Vincent's expression hardened.
“Those signatures were forged.”
“I know that now.”
Margaret turned a page.
“The night Elena disappeared, she came to the hospital after hours. She was bleeding slightly from a fall, and she was terrified. She said Richard Sterling had threatened to take her baby.”
Vincent gripped the back of a chair.
“Why didn't you call the police?”
“I tried. A man arrived before the officers did. He said he was a family attorney and that Elena was being taken somewhere safe.”
“Who was he?”
“Richard's associate. A man named Peter Lang.”
Vincent knew the name. Lang had worked for Sterling's legal firm before leaving Chicago two years earlier.
Margaret continued.
“Elena didn't trust him. She asked me to hide her phone and the medical paperwork. She said she would return for them when she could prove you hadn't abandoned her.”
Vincent's voice broke.
“She thought I didn't want our child.”
“She was told you had signed away your parental rights. She was shown documents with your signature and a letter in your handwriting. She believed the evidence was real, but she still hoped it was a lie.”
Margaret looked directly at Vincent.
“Her last words to me were, ‘If he ever finds out, tell him I tried to come home.’”
Vincent turned away.
For a moment, the feared head of the Moretti family looked like a husband who had lost four years he could never recover.
“What happened after she left the hospital?” he asked.
Margaret took a slow breath.
“I saw her get into a dark sedan. Peter Lang was driving. Another man sat in the front passenger seat. I wrote down the license plate, but the notebook disappeared from my locker the next morning.”
“Who had access?”
“Hospital security. The staff. And the man who called himself a family attorney.”
Vincent looked toward Daniel.
“Find Lang.”
Daniel nodded.
Margaret then turned to me.
“Clara, I need to tell you something about your husband.”
My heart began pounding.
“Did you know Daniel Bennett?”
“I met him twice. He came to the hospital after Elena disappeared. He said he was working for a transport company, but he knew details that weren't public. He asked whether Elena had left a message for Vincent.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That she had. He begged me to keep it safe.”
Margaret reached into her handbag again and pulled out a folded piece of paper.
“I kept this after all these years.”
It was a photocopy of a medical note. The handwriting was Elena's.
If anything happens to me, Daniel knows where Grace is. He is the only person Richard cannot buy.
I covered my mouth.
Vincent stared at the note.
“Where did Daniel take Grace?”
Margaret shook her head.
“I never knew. I only know that, several weeks later, Richard's people returned and asked me whether Elena had delivered a baby.”
Vincent went still.
“What did you say?”
“I told them I had no information.”
“Did they believe you?”
“No. They fired me.”
Silence settled over the room.
Then Margaret's phone rang.
She glanced at the screen and went pale.
Vincent noticed.
“Who is it?”
“I don't know. It's a blocked number.”
“Answer it.”
Margaret hesitated, then put the call on speaker.
A man's voice filled the room.
“Margaret. You've had four years to learn when to stay quiet.”
She stopped breathing.
Vincent stepped forward.
“Who is this?”
The man laughed softly.
“Ask your fiancée's father.”
Then the call ended.
Daniel immediately began tracing the number, but the signal vanished before he could locate it.
Margaret was shaking.
Vincent turned toward her.
“Has this man threatened you before?”
“Several times.”
“Why come here now?”
She looked at the open notebook in her lap.
“Because I received something yesterday.”
She reached into her coat and removed a photograph.
It showed a small girl standing beside a woman in a baseball cap outside a grocery store.
The girl had dark curls and blue eyes.
Grace.
On the back, someone had written a single sentence:
THE CHILD IS SAFE—UNLESS YOU HELP VINCENT FIND HER.
Vincent stared at the photograph.
Then his phone vibrated.
A message from Daniel appeared.
Sir, we've located Peter Lang. He's dead.
Vincent looked up.
“Where?”
Daniel's reply arrived.
In a private clinic outside Chicago. And the police believe he was killed less than twenty-four hours ago.
Margaret began to cry.
Vincent turned the photograph over once more.
May you like
Someone had killed the man who knew where Elena went.
And whoever was behind it had just learned that Vincent was searching again.
Related Stories
