“Yes.”
“How would Gabriel know?”
“Because he has spent thirty years studying how people hide inside systems.”
Marco stared at the phone.
“Put him on.”
“He’s gone.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re lying.”
“No, Marco. I’m not.”
Marco stepped away.
His anger was not loud.
It was too personal for that.
“Tell him I want to speak to him.”
“I already did.”
“And?”
Daniel hesitated.
“He said not yet.”
Marco looked wounded.
It was brief.
Then the familiar control returned.
“Tell him he doesn’t get to choose.”
Daniel gave a tired laugh.
“You two really are alike.”
I almost objected.
Marco did first.
“No, we’re not.”
“Yes,” Daniel said. “You both confuse protecting people with controlling them.”
The words silenced us.
Because they were true.
I looked through the small window in Elena’s door.
She was awake.
Watching me.
“Daniel.”
“Yes?”
“Did Father introduce me to Elena?”
My brother stopped breathing.
I heard it.
The slight catch.
The pause.
“You saw the message.”
“Answer me.”
“I can’t.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“I don’t know the full answer.”
“Tell me what you know.”
Daniel sighed.
“Do you remember why you went to the gallery that night?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I was supposed to meet Arthur Bell.”
“No.”
I frowned.
“What?”
“You weren’t.”
“I had it on my calendar.”
“I know.”
“Then what are you talking about?”
“Arthur was in London.”
I felt the floor shift beneath me.
“He canceled.”
“No. He never scheduled the meeting.”
I said nothing.
Daniel continued.
“I checked his travel records.”
“Why?”
“Because Father’s blue file included a copy of your calendar.”
My pulse hammered.
“From five years ago?”
“Yes.”
“Why would Father have my calendar after he was dead?”
“He didn’t.”
The answer came quietly.
“Someone added it to the file later.”
I looked at Marco.
“Who?”
“We don’t know.”
“And Elena?”
“Her calendar was there too.”
The corridor went silent.
“That’s impossible.”
“She was scheduled to leave work at six.”
I remembered.
She told me she had stayed late because a co-worker asked her to help close.
Daniel continued.
“The co-worker didn’t ask.”
I pressed one hand against the wall.
“Who did?”
“Her supervisor.”
“What was his name?”
“Peter Vale.”
The surname hit me instantly.
Dr. Nathaniel Vale.
The signature on the medical record.
“Related?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where is Peter now?”
“Dead.”
I closed my eyes.
“Of course.”
“He died two years ago.”
“How?”
“Heart condition.”
No violence.
No dramatic secret.
Just another person who could no longer answer questions.
“Luke,” Daniel said, “someone changed both your schedules that night.”
I looked at Elena through the glass.
She was watching me.
Five years.
Every morning.
Every holiday.
Every fight.
Every quiet Sunday.
Our child.
Could a manipulated meeting make any of it less real?
The thought frightened me more than I wanted to admit.
“I need to go,” Daniel said.
“No.”
“I’ll contact you.”
“Daniel.”
“Tell Elena I’m sorry.”
I almost laughed.
“You can tell her yourself.”
“Maybe someday.”
The line disconnected.
I called back.
Nothing.
Marco and I stood in silence.
Finally, he said, “We need to move Elena.”
“No.”
He turned.
“Luke.”
“Dr. Bennett said she needs observation.”
“We don’t know who has access to her chart.”
“Then we protect her here.”
“How?”
I looked toward the nurses’ station.
“Carefully.”
For the first time in my life, I understood something my father never had.
Power was not always the answer.
Sometimes visibility was safer than secrecy.
A hospital was full of records.
Cameras.
Staff.
Witnesses.
Moving Elena into some private hidden location might feel protective.
But that was exactly how we had arrived here.
Men deciding.
Women disappearing from their own lives.
Secrets multiplying.
“No private ambulance,” I said. “No unregistered room. No changing her name.”
Marco studied me.
“That doesn’t sound like you.”
“I know.”
“What does Elena say?”
The question stopped me.
I looked at him.
Then I smiled faintly.
“I suppose I should ask her.”
Marco nodded.
“That’s new.”
“Don’t enjoy it.”
“I’ll try.”
