Chapter 3 - The Sister Who Never Existed
Hannah drove straight to Queens.
Dominic refused to let her go alone.
She refused to ride with him.
They compromised badly.
Hannah drove her old Honda.
Two black SUVs followed.
“This is insane,” she muttered.
She reached the apartment where her father had lived until his death.
Hannah had kept paying for a storage unit in the basement because she had never found the strength to sort through the last boxes.
Now Dominic stood beside her while she unlocked it.
“You stay outside.”
“No.”
“You have a listening problem.”
“I’ve been told.”
Hannah shoved the door upward.
Dust filled the narrow space.
Boxes.
Winter clothes.
Old tax files.
Her father’s fishing gear.
Nothing that explained an identical twin.
Hannah began tearing through everything.
Dominic watched.
After twenty minutes she found a metal cash box.
Locked.
She remembered the blue bird.
Her father had used the same four digits for almost everything.
The year she was born.
The lock clicked.
Inside were three envelopes.
One had her name.
Hannah.
Her fingers shook as she opened it.
The letter was dated eight months before Daniel died.
Hannah,
If you are reading this, then I failed to tell you while I was alive.
I told myself I was protecting you.
Maybe I was only protecting myself from losing you.
Your mother did not give birth to one daughter.
She gave birth to two.
Hannah stopped.
Dominic read silently beside her.
She forced herself to continue.
Your sister’s birth name was Evelyn Mercer.
After your mother died, everything fell apart.
Your aunt Theresa took Evelyn.
I took you.
We were angry, grieving, stupid people who thought separation would be temporary.
It became years.
Theresa moved.
Phone numbers changed.
Lawyers became involved.
By the time I found Evelyn again, she was an adult.
She asked me not to contact you yet.
She said her life had become dangerous.
Hannah’s throat closed.
“No.”
Dominic’s face had turned hard.
She kept reading.
She told me she had married a man named Dominic Vale.
Dominic looked away.
“She knew,” Hannah whispered.
“She knew about me.”
Another line waited below.
Evelyn said someone close to her husband was watching her.
She believed she had discovered something that could get her killed.
She made me promise that if anything happened to her, I would keep you away from the Vale family.
Hannah looked up.
“You.”
Dominic’s expression went cold.
“What?”
“My father thought you were dangerous.”
“He wasn’t wrong.”
“He told me to stay away from you.”
“He didn’t say me.”
Hannah looked back at the letter.
Dominic was right.
It said the Vale family.
She unfolded the second page.
If she disappears, find the blue room.
Do not trust the man with the broken watch.
Hannah frowned.
“What does that mean?”
Dominic went perfectly still.
“What?”
“The broken watch.”
He reached inside his jacket.
Pulled out his phone.
Scrolled to an old photograph.
A family dinner.
Dominic.
Evelyn.
Three other men.
One of them had his arm around Dominic’s shoulder.
Handsome.
Mid-thirties.
Expensive suit.
Gold watch.
The glass face was cracked straight across the center.
Hannah pointed.
“Who is that?”
Dominic didn’t answer immediately.
His jaw tightened.
“My half-brother.”
“What’s his name?”
“Julian.”
A sound came from outside the storage room.
Metal scraped against concrete.
Dominic spun around.
“Down!”
The first gunshot blew through the storage-unit door.
Hannah screamed and dropped.
Dominic pulled her behind a concrete pillar.
Another shot cracked through the lock.
Men shouted in the hallway.
Dominic drew a pistol.
Hannah stared at him.
“You brought a gun into my basement?”
“Focus on the part where someone is shooting at us.”
The lights went out.
Hannah’s heart hammered.
Dominic grabbed her wrist.
“There’s another exit?”
“Laundry room. Thirty feet left.”
“Move.”
They ran.
Bullets struck concrete behind them.
Dominic fired twice.
Someone yelled.
Hannah reached the laundry-room door.
Locked.
“Of course.”
Dominic kicked it once.
Nothing.
Again.
The frame split.
They stumbled inside.
One of Dominic’s bodyguards appeared through the opposite entrance.
“Car’s ready!”
Dominic shoved Hannah toward him.
“Take her.”
Hannah looked back.
“What about you?”
“Go!”
She hated herself for caring.
She ran anyway.
Seconds later they burst into the alley.
A black SUV skidded toward them.
Hannah climbed inside.
Dominic followed moments later.
Blood ran down his hand.
“You’re hit.”
“Glass.”
The SUV accelerated.
Hannah opened the last envelope from her father’s box.
Inside was a key.
Nothing else.
No address.
No label.
Just a tiny red plastic tag.
Emma’s whisper came back to her.
Red door.
Hannah stared at Dominic.
“The girls weren’t talking about a color.”
He looked at the key.
May you like
Hannah closed her fist around it.
“They were telling us where their mother is.”
