Chapter 8 The Woman on the Elevator
The elevator doors opened.
No one stepped out.
Audrey stood perfectly still.
Ethan moved in front of her.
The emergency lights along the floor flickered weakly, casting long shadows across the office.
“Stay behind me,” he whispered.
Audrey almost protested.
Then she saw what was happening beyond the elevator.
The doors were open.
The car was empty.
But the floor indicator showed that someone had selected the executive level manually.
Ethan reached for his phone.
No signal.
Audrey checked hers.
Nothing.
“Someone cut the communications,” Ethan said.
“Can they do that?”
“Inside this building? Yes.”
“Then whoever is here knows your security system.”
He nodded.
The elevator doors began to close.
Ethan stepped forward and pressed the button.
The doors reopened.
A small envelope lay on the floor.
Audrey's name was written across it.
She stared at it.
“Don't touch it,” Ethan said.
“I wasn't going to.”
He used a pen to pull the envelope toward them.
Nothing happened.
He opened it carefully.
Inside was a single sheet of paper.
You have ten minutes.
Below it:
Go to the twenty-third floor.
Ethan frowned.
“There is no twenty-third floor.”
Audrey looked at him.
“What?”
“The building has twenty-two floors.”
She stared at the message.
Then turned toward the elevator.
“Maybe someone wants us to think there isn't one.”
Ethan considered it.
They stepped inside.
He pressed twenty-two.
The doors closed.
Nothing happened.
Then Audrey noticed a small panel beneath the buttons.
She touched it.
A hidden keypad appeared.
Ethan stared.
“That's not on the building plans.”
“Someone built a secret floor.”
She pressed the numbers written on the paper.
2-0-0-6.
The elevator shuddered.
Then began moving upward.
Audrey felt her stomach drop.
The display changed.
22.
Then it went blank.
The elevator continued rising.
Ethan looked at her.
“Whatever is up there, it was never meant to be found.”
Audrey looked down at the birth certificate in her hand.
Neither of them spoke.
The elevator stopped.
The doors opened.
A dark corridor waited beyond them.
No lights.
No sound.
Ethan stepped out first.
Audrey followed.
The walls were unfinished concrete.
There were no offices.
No furniture.
Only a long corridor leading toward a single steel door.
At the end was a security camera.
It turned toward them.
Audrey stopped.
“Someone is watching.”
The camera's red light blinked.
Then a speaker crackled.
A man's voice filled the corridor.
“Ethan.”
Ethan stared at the camera.
“Who are you?”
“You've asked that before.”
“Martin?”
A soft laugh.
“No.”
Audrey's pulse quickened.
“Then who?”
The voice ignored her.
“You were warned to stay away from the Ashford.”
Ethan stepped forward.
“You threatened my wife.”
“No.”
The voice became colder.
“I warned you about what would happen if you failed to listen.”
Audrey looked at Ethan.
“Why us?”
Silence.
Then:
“Because your marriage is the one thing neither family managed to control.”
Audrey's breath caught.
“What does that mean?”
“It means they underestimated you.”
“Who?”
“The people who built their lives on your silence.”
The speaker clicked off.
Ethan walked toward the steel door.
It opened before he touched it.
Inside was a room filled with file cabinets.
Dozens of them.
A large table stood in the center.
On the wall were photographs.
Audrey's family.
Ethan's family.
Their wedding.
Their childhoods.
Their homes.
Their businesses.
Their lives.
Audrey stopped breathing.
Someone had been watching them for years.
There were photographs of Audrey as a teenager.
At school.
At university.
At her first music recital.
There were photographs of Ethan at business meetings.
With his father.
With Victoria.
With Audrey.
She stepped closer to one wall.
A photograph showed her and Ethan on their honeymoon.
Another showed them having dinner at a restaurant.
Another showed them entering their home.
“These were taken after we married.”
Ethan's face hardened.
“Yes.”
“Who took them?”
“I don't know.”
She looked at the photographs again.
Then she saw something that made her blood run cold.
A picture of herself standing in the music room.
She had been alone.
The photograph had been taken from inside the house.
The date was three months earlier.
The same day she had first noticed that one of her grandfather's old music books was missing.
Someone had been inside their home.
Watching her.
For how long?
She turned away.
Ethan noticed.
“You don't have to look.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No.”
She faced him.
“I've spent seven years believing our home was safe.”
Ethan's expression softened.
“I know.”
“No, you don't.”
She looked at the photographs.
“I thought the worst thing in our marriage was being ignored.”
Her voice shook.
“Now I find out someone has been watching us.”
Ethan stepped closer.
“I should have protected you.”
Audrey looked at him.
“You should have trusted me.”
He nodded.
“Yes.”
She looked away.
A file on the table caught her attention.
It was labeled:
CALLoway-Parker Marriage
Audrey opened it.
Inside were pages about their relationship.
When they met.
When they married.
Their financial arrangements.
Family disputes.
Arguments.
Medical appointments.
Private vacations.
Even conversations they had forgotten.
Ethan looked sick.
“This isn't possible.”
Audrey turned another page.
There was a transcript of a conversation they had in their kitchen three years earlier.
A private conversation.
No staff had been present.
No cameras should have been there.
Ethan read the page.
“Someone bugged the house.”
Audrey closed the file.
“We need to leave.”
“Not yet.”
She looked at him.
He pointed to the final document.
It was a photograph of their wedding.
A red circle had been drawn around one person standing behind them.
Audrey recognized him.
So did Ethan.
“That's impossible,” Ethan whispered.
The man in the photograph was Richard Calloway.
But the photograph had been taken seven years after Richard's death.
Audrey stared.
“That's your father.”
Ethan's face had gone completely white.
“He died two years before our wedding.”
“Then who is that?”
Neither had an answer.
A sound came from behind them.
The steel door closed.
They turned.
A woman stood in the corridor.
Audrey recognized her immediately.
Victoria Hart.
She was dressed in a dark coat, her long blonde hair pulled neatly behind her shoulders.
The emerald bracelet was missing from her wrist.
Her expression was calm.
Almost sad.
Ethan stepped forward.
“Victoria.”
She looked at him.
“You should have listened to me.”
Audrey moved beside him.
“You were at the station.”
Victoria's eyes shifted toward her.
“Yes.”
“You were at my grandmother's house.”
“Yes.”
“You've been following us.”
Victoria shook her head.
“Not exactly.”
“Then explain.”
Victoria looked around the room.
“Someone else has been following you.”
“Who?”
She looked at Ethan.
“Your father.”
Ethan's expression hardened.
“My father is dead.”
“I know.”
“Then stop saying his name.”
Victoria's face softened.
“That is exactly what he wanted.”
Ethan stared at her.
“What does that mean?”
Victoria stepped inside.
“I didn't come here to hurt you.”
“Then why are you here?”
“To stop you from opening the last file.”
Audrey looked toward the table.
“What file?”
Victoria's expression changed.
She knew exactly which one.
“The file marked Parker.”
Audrey reached for it.
Victoria moved quickly.
“Don't!”
Audrey stopped.
“Why?”
“Because once you open it, you will know what your grandmother did.”
Audrey's voice hardened.
“Martin already told me.”
“Martin doesn't know the whole story.”
“Then tell me.”
Victoria looked at her for a long moment.
“I owe your family the truth.”
“Why?”
Victoria swallowed.
“Because I am your mother's sister.”
Audrey froze.
Ethan looked between them.
Victoria continued.
“Your mother was not Evelyn's only child.”
Audrey's heart pounded.
“My grandmother had two daughters.”
“Yes.”
“You.”
Victoria nodded.
“My real name is Vivian.”
Audrey stared at her.
The name from the file.
The name on the birth records.
“Why did you change it?”
Victoria looked toward the photograph of Richard.
“Because your grandmother wanted me dead.”
The room went silent.
Audrey shook her head.
“No.”
“She tried.”
“Why?”
“Because I knew what happened to James.”
Audrey stepped closer.
“What happened?”
Victoria's eyes filled with tears.
“I watched him leave the Ashford alive.”
Ethan stared.
“You said he was taken.”
“He was.”
“By whom?”
Victoria looked directly at Audrey.
“Your grandmother.”
Audrey's breath caught.
Victoria reached into her coat.
She removed a small photograph.
She placed it on the table.
It showed James Parker standing beside a car.
Evelyn was behind him.
And another woman stood near the driver's door.
Victoria.
Younger.
Terrified.
On the back was a handwritten sentence.
James never disappeared. He was hidden.
Audrey looked up.
“Where?”
Victoria's voice dropped.
“I don't know.”
“Then how can you be sure?”
“Because I helped hide him.”
Ethan stepped forward.
“Why?”
Victoria looked at Audrey.
“Because your grandmother told me that if James ever came back, they would kill your mother.”
Audrey felt tears burn her eyes.
“My mother was involved?”
“Your mother knew enough to be afraid.”
“Then why did she never tell me?”
Victoria's face tightened.
“Because she died before she could.”
Audrey looked at the photograph again.
There was something written in the corner.
A number.
17.
“What is that?”
Victoria looked at it.
Her expression changed.
“That's the room.”
“What room?”
“The room where James was kept.”
Audrey's pulse raced.
“Where?”
Victoria looked toward the floor.
“Beneath your grandmother's house.”
Ethan immediately turned toward the elevator.
“We're going there.”
Victoria caught his arm.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because someone is already there.”
Audrey stared at her.
“Who?”
Victoria's voice became almost a whisper.
“The person who has been waiting twenty years for you to find the truth.”
At that exact moment, Audrey's phone vibrated.
She looked down.
A photograph had arrived.
It showed Rachel Parker asleep on her sofa.
The message beneath it contained only six words:
You should have stayed at home.