Chapter 5 - Don't Make the Grumpy Face
I don't remember screaming.
I remember Vincent catching me before I hit the floor.
I remember Renzo shouting orders.
I remember the ride back to the estate taking twelve minutes and feeling like twelve years.
The front gates were open.
A guard had been found unconscious near the nursery.
Claire's phone lay smashed beneath a hedge.
There was no ransom note.
No message.
Nothing.
I turned on Vincent.
“This happened because of you.”
He didn't defend himself.
That somehow made me angrier.
“I brought her here because you said she'd be safe!”
“I know.”
“You promised me.”
“I know.”
I hit his chest.
Once.
Then again.
Renzo moved forward.
Vincent stopped him with one hand.
I hit Vincent until I couldn't anymore.
Then he held my wrists.
“I will find her.”
“You don't know that.”
“Yes.”
His voice broke on the single word.
For the first time I remembered he had already lost one little girl.
Vincent released me.
“Five years ago, I arrived too late.”
His eyes were wet, though no tear fell.
“I will not arrive too late again.”
Security footage showed Claire carrying Mia through a service exit.
But Claire wasn't behaving like a kidnapper.
She kept looking behind her.
At one point she bent down and hugged Mia.
“She was protecting her,” I whispered.
Vincent replayed the footage.
Someone appeared three seconds later.
A man in a maintenance uniform.
Claire saw him and ran.
The camera lost them near the trees.
Vincent's team traced Claire's car.
It was found abandoned eight miles away.
Inside was Mia's pink hair bow.
I held it against my chest.
Then Renzo found something.
A voice message.
Claire had called the estate's emergency line while driving.
Wind and traffic drowned most of it.
But one sentence came through.
“Don't trust Calder.”
Vincent went still.
“Who is Calder?”
Renzo answered.
“Thomas Calder. Vincent's security director.”
The same man responsible for protecting the estate.
The same man who had known we were going to Brook Street.
Calder was gone.
So were two vehicles and three guards assigned to him.
The traitor had been inside the house all along.
Hours passed.
Then Vincent's phone rang.
Calder.
Vincent put it on speaker.
“You have something I want,” Calder said.
Vincent's voice was terrifyingly calm.
“You have something I love.”
I looked at him.
He didn't seem to realize what he'd said.
Calder laughed.
“The drive from Margaret's house. Bring it to Pier Nineteen at midnight.”
“We don't have whatever Lucia hid.”
“Then find it.”
A child's voice sounded in the background.
“Mr. Grumpy?”
My knees almost gave out.
“Mia!” I shouted.
“Mommy?”
Then Calder pulled the phone away.
Vincent leaned toward it.
“If you hurt her—”
“Save the speech.”
The line disconnected.
Vincent stared at the phone.
I grabbed his arm.
“She sounded okay.”
“For now.”
We had four hours.
The USB contained only Lucia's video.
But she'd said Margaret knew where the evidence was.
We searched the metal box again.
Nothing.
Then I noticed the silver bracelet.
Small charms hung from it.
A heart.
A star.
And a tiny dollhouse.
I remembered Sofia's bedroom.
The dollhouse.
We raced back upstairs.
Vincent knelt where Mia had found Lucia's letter.
He pulled the dollhouse away from the wall.
Nothing.
I opened it.
Tiny furniture filled each room.
Vincent stared.
Then he picked up a miniature pink bed.
Underneath was a memory card.
Lucia had hidden the financial records in her daughter's toy.
Renzo loaded it.
Hundreds of transactions appeared.
Calder's name was everywhere.
So were payments connected to the truck driver who had killed Lucia and Sofia.
Vincent stared at the screen.
Five years of grief became something colder.
“He killed them.”
Renzo touched his shoulder.
“Vince.”
Vincent closed his eyes.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered immediately.
“Mia?”
Whispering.
“Mommy.”
My hand shook.
“How did you get a phone?”
“Claire gave it.”
“Where are you?”
“I don't know.”
I heard Mia breathing.
Then she whispered something else.
“Claire says tell Mr. Grumpy there's boats.”
Vincent grabbed a map.
“Anything else, sweetheart?”
Mia became quiet.
Then:
“Big red number.”
“What number?”
“Twenty-seven.”
Renzo pointed at the waterfront map.
Warehouse 27.
Not Pier Nineteen.
Calder had lied.
Vincent looked at me.
“We know where she is.”
He headed for the door.
I followed.
“No.”
“She's my daughter.”
“Elena—”
“Try stopping me.”
For one second, even in the middle of terror, his eyebrow lifted.
I lifted mine back.
Exactly like Mia.
Renzo made a sound that might have been a laugh if any of us remembered how.
Then Vincent handed me a bulletproof vest.
“Stay behind me.”
“Fine.”
“And Elena?”
“What?”
May you like
His face softened.
“When we get her back, remind me never to make that face around either of you again.”
