Chapter 3 - WHAT WAS HIDDEN IN THE WALL
Z
Jessica did not answer Nora's first call.
Or the second.
By the fifth, Adrian took the phone gently out of Nora's hand.
“She isn't going to answer.”
“You don't know that.”
“No. But calling repeatedly tells her you're frightened.”
“I am frightened.”
“That's different from advertising it.”
Nora glared at him.
They sat inside what had once been Bellweather's private dining room while security searched the building.
A medic had cleaned the scrape along Nora's temple.
Adrian had refused treatment for the cut across his right hand.
Nora noticed anyway.
“You're bleeding.”
“So are you.”
“Mine has a bandage.”
He looked at her.
“That sounds competitive.”
“Give me your hand.”
“Nora—”
“Your employees might be terrified of you. I'm not.”
A man standing near the door coughed suspiciously.
Adrian slowly held out his hand.
Nora cleaned the cut with the small medical kit on the table.
“You're very calm about somebody trying to drop a ceiling on us.”
“I'll be angry later.”
“You looked pretty angry downstairs.”
“That was restrained.”
Nora paused.
She believed him.
One of Adrian's men entered.
“Mr. Cross.”
His name was Marcus Vale, Adrian's head of security. Nora had learned that because he introduced himself after checking her pupils for signs of concussion.
“We found evidence of entry through the service tunnel.”
Adrian's gaze sharpened.
“What tunnel?”
Marcus looked toward Nora.
She answered.
“Bellweather had delivery tunnels beneath the western foundation. Coal, laundry, kitchen supplies. Most buildings this age near the waterfront had something similar.”
“On the current plans?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Probably sealed during the 1956 renovation.”
Marcus placed a small metal object on the table.
A modern electronic key card.
Nora recognized the logo.
Ellison Architectural Preservation.
Her office.
Her stomach turned.
“That doesn't prove Jessica.”
“No,” Adrian said. “It doesn't.”
The fact that he wasn't rushing to blame her friend—or former friend—surprised Nora.
“Can you trace it?”
Marcus nodded.
“Already doing it.”
Nora stood.
“I want to see the tunnel.”
Adrian said, “No.”
She looked at him.
He continued, “Someone nearly killed you thirty minutes ago.”
“And whoever did it used an architectural access card inside a historic service route. You need an architect.”
“I have architects.”
“You have architects who quit.”
Marcus looked down again.
Nora folded her arms.
Adrian stared at her for five silent seconds.
“Stay beside me.”
“That sounded suspiciously like agreement.”
“It was a threat disguised as compromise.”
“Charming.”
The service tunnel smelled of wet stone and rust.
Nora moved slowly, flashlight tracing brickwork.
Most of it dated to the original construction.
At the end of the corridor, newer blocks covered an old doorway.
She stopped.
“These aren't right.”
Adrian came closer.
“What?”
“The mortar.”
She touched the joint.
“Everything around this opening is lime-based historic mortar. This section is Portland cement. Maybe twenty years old. Maybe less.”
“So somebody sealed something.”
“Yes.”
Marcus called for tools.
Twenty minutes later, one block came loose.
Behind it was darkness.
Not another room.
A narrow cavity.
Nora reached in before Adrian could stop her.
Her fingertips struck metal.
She withdrew a small steel box.
Adrian's expression changed.
He knew it.
“What is this?”
He took it.
A faded label remained attached to the lid.
CROSS SHIPPING - INTERNAL ARCHIVE 14C.
Adrian went perfectly still.
“How old were you twenty years ago?” Nora asked.
“Nineteen.”
He opened the box.
Inside were paper ledgers protected by plastic, several photographs, and three old data drives.
Marcus whispered a curse.
Adrian lifted the first photograph.
Nora saw four men standing beside shipping containers.
One was a younger Adrian.
Another looked enough like him to be family.
His father.
The third man was unfamiliar.
The fourth was not.
Nora grabbed Adrian's wrist.
“Wait.”
She stared.
The fourth man was much younger.
But unmistakable.
Richard Pierce.
Lincoln's father.
Adrian looked at her.
“You know him.”
“That's Lincoln's dad.”
Silence swallowed the tunnel.
Adrian examined her face.
“You're certain?”
“I spent five Christmases at that man's house.”
Marcus took out his phone.
Nora's thoughts raced.
Richard Pierce had supposedly built a fortune in logistics consulting before retiring to Arizona.
Lincoln had told Nora his father barely knew anyone in Seattle.
Another lie.
“How long has your family known the Pierces?” she asked.
Adrian did not answer immediately.
“My father employed Richard Pierce for eleven years.”
Nora's skin prickled.
“He never told me.”
“Why would Lincoln tell you?”
“Because I asked.”
Adrian closed the metal box.
Nora looked at him.
“I asked Lincoln once if his father's work ever crossed yours. It was after Cross Meridian bought one of his old warehouses. Lincoln told me Richard had never met you.”
Adrian's jaw tightened.
Marcus's phone rang.
He answered, listened, then looked directly at Nora.
“The access card was assigned to Jessica Ward.”
Nora's chest tightened.
She shouldn't have felt shocked.
Not anymore.
Yet betrayal apparently had layers.
Her phone buzzed.
Jessica.
One message.
DON'T TRUST ANYONE AT CROSS.
Nora stared.
Another arrived.
LINCOLN DIDN'T MEET YOU BY ACCIDENT.
Adrian read her face.
“What?”
Nora showed him.
His eyes stopped on the second sentence.
A third text appeared.
I'M SORRY.
A fourth.
FOR EVERYTHING.
Then Nora's phone rang.
Jessica.
Nora answered immediately.
“Jessica?”
Breathing.
Fast.
Terrified.
“Nora.”
“Where are you?”
“I didn't know about the ceiling.”
Nora closed her eyes.
“So you knew about something.”
Jessica started crying.
“Lincoln said nobody would get hurt.”
Adrian took one step closer.
Nora said, “What did he make you do?”
“He didn't make me sleep with him.”
The honesty was brutal.
Jessica sobbed.
“That part was me.”
Nora's throat closed.
“But the building—Nora, he needed the archive.”
“What archive?”
“The box you just found.”
Nora looked at Adrian.
“How do you know we found it?”
Jessica went silent.
Then whispered, “Because Lincoln has been looking for it for five years.”
Five years.
Exactly as long as Nora had known him.
The tunnel seemed colder.
“Jessica.”
“I tried to warn you.”
“You slept with my boyfriend.”
“I know.”
“You had five years to warn me.”
“I know.”
“Why did Lincoln date me?”
Jessica's breath shook.
“Because of where you worked.”
Nora leaned against the wall.
Adrian's face became unreadable.
Jessica continued.
“Your firm had the original Bellweather records. Your credentials gave you access to restricted preservation archives. Lincoln needed somebody close enough to the project to find where Richard Pierce hid evidence.”
Nora's eyes filled.
Every anniversary.
Every vacation.
The apartment key.
The proposal conversations.
Five years.
“Did he ever love me?”
Jessica whispered, “I don't know.”
Some answers hurt worse than no.
A sound exploded through the phone.
Jessica screamed.
The call ended.
“Jessica!”
Nothing.
Nora called back.
Straight to voicemail.
Marcus was already moving.
Adrian said, “Trace the phone.”
Then Nora's own phone buzzed again.
Not Jessica.
Lincoln.
A photograph loaded.
Jessica sat tied to a chair.
Blood ran from her lower lip.
Below it was one sentence.
BRING ME THE BOX, NORA.
May you like
ALONE.
OR YOUR BEST FRIEND DIES.
