Chapter 10 - The Boy in the Photograph
I wanted to run straight into the parking garage. Ruth blocked the door, not with a command but with a question.
"What does the message want you to do?"
"Trade myself."
"And why would the person who took him keep a promise?"
I hated how quickly she'd said it, and how clearly she was right.
Noah called a specialist team while June searched Mateo's public school fundraiser page. In a picture taken two months ago, he wore a blue soccer jersey and held up a science-fair ribbon. Behind him stood Lena, smiling with the strained pride of a tired parent.
I looked at his face. He had no idea what our family had done to his.
The disposable phone from the archive suddenly rang. Noah placed it on speaker.
"You have forty minutes," a distorted voice said.
"Let me hear Mateo," I replied.
A pause. Then a young man's voice: "Mom? Don't come."
Someone struck something hard near him. The sound made everyone in the room flinch. I leaned closer to the phone.
"Mateo, I'm Claire. Your mom is trying to get you home. Tell me what you see."
"There's a clock. It doesn't have a second hand. And I can smell bread."
The line went dead.
June whispered, "Westbridge bakery district. There used to be a wholesale bread plant next to the terminal. It closed last year."
Noah looked at her. "How do you know?"
"My dad delivered there for twenty years."
A plan came together in hurried sentences. Officers would approach through the storm drain that emerged behind the plant. Ruth would coordinate. I would not go inside. I agreed, though every part of me resisted waiting.
At the operations van, Ruth handed me her headphones. "You should hear this."
A microphone inside the bread plant carried a man's voice, low and furious.
"Tell Shaw the boy is insurance. If Claire doesn't arrive, I want Daniel Mercer blamed."
May you like
It was Adrian.
THE DOORS SHE OPENED •
