Chapter 4 - THE ROOM VICTOR NEVER OPENED
Victor's townhouse was nothing like I expected.
No gold.
No marble lions.
No giant portrait of himself looking angry.
It was quiet.
Almost empty.
Mateo loved the library.
I hated that he loved the library because it made leaving harder.
Victor gave us the entire third floor.
Then he disappeared into work.
For three days, we investigated Caldwell.
At night, I heard Victor walking.
Always after two.
One night I found him in the kitchen.
He was making coffee.
“You don't sleep?”
“Not much.”
“Why?”
“Bad investment.”
I laughed.
He didn't.
There was something behind his eyes.
“Who did you lose?”
He looked at me sharply.
“Why do you assume I lost someone?”
“People who are happy sleep.”
“That is terrible science.”
“Answer.”
He didn't.
The next afternoon I accidentally found the room.
Locked.
Except the cleaner had left it open.
Inside were photographs of a woman.
Dark hair.
Beautiful smile.
Victor beside her.
Younger.
Happy.
Newspaper clippings covered one table.
BUILDING COLLAPSE KILLS SEVEN.
I heard Victor behind me.
“Get out.”
I turned.
“I didn't—”
“Now.”
I left.
That evening he apologized.
Her name had been Sofia.
His younger sister.
She died twelve years earlier when the balcony of a luxury apartment building collapsed.
The developer?
Caldwell.
The structural engineer who had tried to warn them?
My father.
I couldn't breathe.
“Luis testified privately to Victor's family,” he said. “He said Caldwell had substituted cheaper steel.”
“What happened to him?”
“I don't know.”
“You investigated?”
“For twelve years.”
“And?”
“Nothing.”
Victor had hated Caldwell long before I dropped water on Ethan.
Suddenly Table 23 made sense.
“You didn't stand up because of me.”
“Yes, I did.”
“But you already hated Ethan.”
“I hated his father.”
“That's different.”
He stepped closer.
“Anna, I stood because a man put his hands on you and everyone else decided money made it acceptable.”
I looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because twelve years ago, everyone looked away from something else.”
Sofia.
The building.
His grief.
He continued quietly.
“I promised myself I wouldn't.”
I kissed him.
I don't know why.
Maybe because he looked less like Victor DeLuca in that moment and more like a brother who had spent twelve years standing beside a grave.
He kissed me back.
Then stopped.
“This is complicated.”
“I noticed.”
“I am not good for uncomplicated people.”
“Who told you I'm uncomplicated?”
Before he could answer, Mateo shouted from upstairs.
We ran.
His laptop displayed an email.
No sender.
One sentence.
ANNA, YOUR FATHER DIDN'T ABANDON YOU.
Attached was a photograph.
Luis Martinez.
Alive.
May you like
Taken three days earlier.
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