Chapter 15 - Ink Over a Scar
Damon's left shoulder carried a black-and-gray raven tattoo. Beneath it lay a childhood scar he'd never explained, a small pale crescent near the collarbone.
The jacket smelled of cedar and years of storage. Damon found a stain near the hem where he’d spilled strawberry soda on his eighth birthday. That stain had survived every move, every fight, and every attempt to reinvent himself. It felt strange that something so small could carry so much.
"A scar isn't a safe," Damon said.
"No," Ruth replied. "But your mother used it as a map. Before she left, she had a small metal tag hidden in the lining of your favorite jacket. You kept the jacket after she was gone."
Damon remembered it instantly: blue denim, a missing button, a yellow patch she'd stitched over a tear. He had worn it until he could barely fit one arm through the sleeve. Warren had packed it away with his father's old tools.
"It's in my workshop," Damon said.
An investigator accompanied him there. A room that usually smelled of motor oil and hot metal felt unnaturally quiet as Damon opened an old cedar trunk.
The jacket lay at the bottom, exactly as he remembered.
He touched the patch. His mother's uneven yellow stitches had once embarrassed him at school. Now he wanted to press the fabric against his face.
A technician carefully opened the lining. A metal tag slid out with a microfilm strip sealed inside.
"That might be evidence," Tessa said over speakerphone. "Don't handle it further."
Damon stepped back while it was secured.
Later that evening, analysts extracted a list of patient numbers and corporate payments. One entry matched June's birth date. Another pointed to a private storage unit rented through an offshore company.
"We're getting closer," Maya said.
Damon couldn't shake the feeling that the information had been waiting for him his whole life.
At 10:17 p.m., a surveillance alert reached Tessa. Warren had entered the storage facility carrying two heavy bags. He left without them.
"We have the unit number," Tessa said. "And one more detail."
May you like
Damon listened.
"The rental's secondary contact is Hannah Vale. Her signature is dated yesterday."
