Chapter 3
Eli stared at the man.
The alley seemed to disappear around us.
Even the train overhead sounded far away.
“My father is dead,” Eli said.
Rachel gripped his shoulder.
“Yes.”
The tall man flinched.
Donna folded her arms.
“That’s what she told you?”
Rachel turned on her.
“Shut up.”
The man took another step.
“My name is Thomas.”
Eli backed away.
“I don’t care.”
Thomas stopped immediately.
His face looked shattered.
He was maybe forty.
Clean-shaven.
Expensive coat.
The kind of man who looked like he had never slept under a bridge or counted coins for dinner.
His eyes never left Eli.
“How old are you?”
Rachel shouted, “Don’t answer him.”
Eli looked confused.
“Mom?”
“We’re leaving.”
She grabbed his hand.
Donna blocked the alley entrance.
“No.”
I stepped forward.
“Move.”
Donna laughed.
“You’re involved enough, Claire.”
“Move.”
“You have no idea what she is.”
Rachel looked at me.
“Don’t listen.”
Donna pointed at her.
“She kidnapped that boy.”
Thomas went pale.
Eli tightened his grip on Rachel.
“She’s my mom.”
“I know,” Thomas whispered.
Donna continued.
“Seven years ago, Rachel disappeared from my brother’s life without warning. She took his son before he even knew she was pregnant.”
Rachel laughed once.
It sounded bitter.
“That’s your story?”
Thomas’s jaw tightened.
“You left a note.”
“Because I was running for my life.”
Donna rolled her eyes.
“Always dramatic.”
Rachel pulled the gold locket from Eli’s hand.
She opened it.
Then she turned the photograph outward.
“Tell him who took this picture.”
Thomas stared.
His face changed.
“Rachel…”
“Tell him.”
Thomas swallowed.
“I did.”
Eli looked between them.
Rachel’s voice shook.
“It was taken the night before I ran.”
Donna said, “Because you were planning to disappear.”
“No.”
Rachel’s eyes hardened.
“Because that was the night you found out your sister had been stealing from you.”
Thomas went still.
Donna’s smile vanished.
“What?”
Rachel kept going.
“You remember the account from the Lincoln Park property?”
Thomas stared at Donna.
Donna said quickly, “She’s lying.”
“The account ending in 8841.”
Thomas’s face drained.
Rachel gave a broken laugh.
“You never told me that number, Thomas. I found it when I was doing bookkeeping for your company.”
Donna stepped toward Rachel.
“Stop talking.”
Rachel didn’t.
“I found transfers. Small ones at first. Five thousand. Eight thousand. Then larger ones.”
Thomas looked at his sister.
“What is she talking about?”
“Nothing.”
“Donna?”
“She was stealing from the company herself.”
Rachel shook her head.
“You know I wasn’t.”
Donna’s voice sharpened.
“She vanished with forty thousand dollars.”
“I vanished with sixty-three dollars and the clothes I was wearing.”
Thomas stared at her.
Rachel opened the locket wider.
“There’s something behind the photograph.”
Donna lunged.
I blocked her.
“Don’t.”
“Claire, move!”
Thomas grabbed Donna’s wrist.
“What’s behind it?”
Rachel’s hands shook.
“I don’t know anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“I put a copy of the account number and a storage key behind the picture.”
Donna stopped struggling.
Thomas turned to her slowly.
Rachel looked at the locket.
“I thought if anything happened to me, somebody would find it.”
She slid a fingernail under the photograph.
A tiny folded strip of paper fell out.
And a small brass key.
Eli stared.
“I never knew that was there.”
Rachel whispered, “You weren’t supposed to.”
Thomas picked up the folded paper.
Donna said, “Don’t.”
He opened it.
His eyes moved across the handwritten numbers.
His hand began to tremble.
“That was my private account.”
Donna’s face hardened.
“You’re believing her?”
“This account was never in company records.”
Rachel nodded.
“You gave me access because we were supposed to get married.”
Eli looked at Thomas.
“Married?”
Thomas’s eyes filled again.
Rachel pulled Eli close.
“It was a long time ago.”
Thomas looked toward his sister.
“You told me Rachel emptied that account.”
“She did.”
Rachel shook her head.
“No. Donna moved the money.”
Thomas’s voice went quiet.
“How much?”
Rachel said, “By the time I discovered it, almost three hundred thousand.”
Donna laughed too loudly.
“This is insane.”
Rachel stared at her.
“And when I confronted you, you told me nobody would believe a pregnant bookkeeper over the owner’s sister.”
Thomas looked sick.
Rachel’s voice dropped.
“You were right.”
The alley became silent.
Then Thomas asked the question none of us wanted to hear.
“Why did you tell me she left voluntarily?”
Donna’s eyes flashed.
“Because she did!”
Rachel suddenly lifted the sleeve of her coat.
There was an old scar across her forearm.
“I got this when Donna pushed me down the service stairs.”
Eli gasped.
Thomas stared.
Donna scoffed.
“You fell.”
“You were standing above me.”
“You were hysterical.”
“I was fourteen weeks pregnant.”
Thomas stumbled backward.
Rachel’s eyes were wet now.
“You came to the hospital that night.”
Thomas frowned.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No, I didn’t.”
Rachel stared at him.
“I saw you outside my room.”
Thomas shook his head.
“I was in Milwaukee.”
Donna’s face changed.
Tiny.
But I saw it.
So did Rachel.
“You told me he came,” Rachel whispered.
Donna said nothing.
Rachel’s breath caught.
“You told me Thomas stood outside my room and refused to enter.”
Thomas looked at Donna.
“What?”
Rachel looked like the ground had moved beneath her.
“You said he knew about the baby.”
Thomas’s voice cracked.
“I didn’t know.”
Donna stepped back.
Nobody let her leave.
Rachel’s hand went over her mouth.
For seven years, she had believed something.
A betrayal.
A rejection.
And now I could see the truth breaking her apart.
Thomas whispered, “I would have come.”
Rachel shook her head.
“Don’t.”
“I would have come.”
“Don’t say that now.”
“I loved you.”
Her eyes flashed.
“You stopped looking for me after three months.”
Thomas looked stunned.
“I looked for two years.”
“No.”
“I hired investigators.”
Donna spoke quickly.
“They found nothing.”
Thomas looked at her.
“You handled the investigators.”
Donna didn’t answer.
His expression darkened.
“You handled every update.”
Rachel whispered, “Of course she did.”
Thomas stepped toward Donna.
“What did you do?”
Donna’s chin lifted.
“Protected you.”
“From what?”
“Her.”
Rachel laughed through tears.
Thomas shouted, “From what?”
Donna finally snapped.
“From losing everything!”
Her voice echoed between the brick walls.
She looked around.
Realized what she had said.
Too late.
Thomas stared at her.
“What did I almost lose?”
Donna’s breathing turned fast.
“You don’t understand.”
“Then explain it.”
She pointed at Rachel.
“She was going to ruin us.”
“You mean expose you.”
“She didn’t understand business.”
“Stealing isn’t business.”
Donna’s eyes became cold.
“You always were weak when it came to her.”
Thomas stared at his sister as if seeing a stranger.
Donna looked at Eli.
“And now look. Seven years later, she comes back with a starving child and suddenly everyone thinks she’s a saint.”
Rachel stepped forward.
“I didn’t come back.”
Donna sneered.
“You’re standing in Chicago.”
“Because Eli has asthma.”
The anger left Thomas’s face.
“What?”
Rachel immediately regretted saying it.
Eli looked down.
Thomas moved closer.
“Does he have medicine?”
Rachel said nothing.
I knew the answer.
“No,” I whispered.
Thomas looked at her.
“Rachel.”
“I couldn’t afford the refill.”
His face crumpled.
“Why didn’t you contact me?”
She stared at him.
“Because I thought you wanted us gone.”
Thomas closed his eyes.
The pain on his face made even me look away.
Then Donna reached inside her purse.
Rachel screamed.
“Watch her!”
Thomas grabbed Donna’s arm.
But Donna had already pulled out her phone.
Not a weapon.
She hit one number.
“Come now,” she said.
Thomas tore the phone from her hand.
“Who did you call?”
Donna smiled.
“The people who know how to clean up your messes.”
Thomas’s face darkened.
“What people?”
A black SUV screeched to a stop at the mouth of the alley.
Two men stepped out.
Rachel grabbed Eli.
I felt fear race through me.
Thomas moved in front of them.
“Get behind me.”
Donna shouted to the men.
“Take the boy.”
Thomas spun.
“What?”
One of the men advanced.
Rachel screamed, “Run, Eli!”
And that was when everything exploded.
The man reached for Eli.
Thomas tackled him into the wall.
The second grabbed Rachel.
I swung the paper bag in my hand without thinking.
A glass water bottle inside struck his face.
He let go.
Rachel fell.
Eli screamed.
Donna grabbed the locket from Rachel’s hand.
Then she ran.
Not toward the street.
Deeper into the alley.
“Donna!” Thomas shouted.
She disappeared through the back entrance of an abandoned building.
The two men fled after her when a police siren sounded nearby.
The woman from the diner.
She had called them after all.
Thomas knelt beside Rachel.
“Are you hurt?”
She pushed away from him.
“Don’t touch me.”
He froze.
Eli wrapped both arms around her.
Police cars stopped at the alley entrance.
Officers rushed toward us.
Donna was gone.
The locket was gone.
And with it, the storage key.
Thomas looked toward the abandoned building.
“What was in that storage unit?”
Rachel’s face went pale.
“Everything.”
“What does that mean?”
She looked at him.
“Bank records.”
Thomas waited.
May you like
Rachel swallowed.
“And the recording Donna tried to kill me for.”
