Chapter 2 - The Woman on the Screen
The guards shoved Naomi into a service hallway that smelled of bleach and burnt coffee. One kept hold of her elbow even after she stopped moving.
"I'm not running," she told him.
"That's what they all say."
"Let her go," Voss said from behind them.
The guard released her. Voss waited until a kitchen door swung shut before speaking.
"You need to leave the hotel."
"Take down my mother's picture."
"That isn't my decision."
"Neither was kicking me in the face, but your boss tried it anyway."
Voss glanced toward the ceiling camera. "Don't say anything else in this hall."
Naomi followed his glance. He had a soldier's posture and a scar on his jaw. She remembered seeing him three years earlier, outside Briar House, watching firefighters pull blackened furniture through the lobby. Back then, he'd told her the family was devastated. Now he looked like a man who hadn't slept since.
"You were there," she said. "The night of the fire."
His jaw tightened. "I was doing my job."
"My mom was doing hers. She cleaned those hallways for twelve years, and when the smoke hit, she ran upstairs for Ruby and Danny Bell. Your people told the reporters she left a space heater on. She didn't even own one."
"Go home, Naomi."
"Don't use my name like you know me."
He took a folded envelope from inside his jacket and offered it to her. No logo. No return address.
Naomi didn't touch it. "How much to shut me up?"
"It's not money."
A door banged. A young woman in a headset hurried toward them, holding a phone. "Mr. Voss? The ballroom clip is already everywhere. The hotel livestream caught the audio. Mrs. Sterling wants the feed pulled."
Voss closed his eyes for one exhausted second. When he opened them, he pushed the envelope into Naomi's hand.
"Use the side exit. Don't go back to your apartment tonight."
"Why?"
He looked directly at her. "Because somebody has spent three years making sure you never ask the right question. And tonight you did."
Naomi tore open the envelope as he walked away. Inside was a single photograph: Briar House's rear stairwell, its steel exit door glowing red on a security monitor.
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On the back, in block letters, someone had written:
ASK WHO LOCKED STAIRWELL B.
