Chapter 5 - The Wolf on Wet Paper
Audrey went home anyway.
She needed clothes.
She needed sleep.
Most of all, she needed to stand inside her own apartment and remind herself that she still possessed a life that had nothing to do with Dorian Ashford.
The illusion lasted eleven minutes.
Her apartment door was unlocked.
Audrey stopped halfway down the hallway.
She distinctly remembered locking it.
She always locked it.
Years of living alone had turned the habit into muscle memory.
Her hand moved toward her phone.
She did not enter.
Instead she backed toward the stairwell and called Dorian.
He answered immediately.
“What happened?”
No hello.
No question about why she was calling.
Almost as if he had been waiting.
“My door is open.”
“Do not go inside.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Go downstairs.”
Audrey heard movement on his end.
“I’m sending—”
A sound came from inside the apartment.
A drawer closing.
Audrey’s heart jumped.
Somebody was still there.
She moved quickly toward the stairs.
Behind her, the apartment door opened.
Audrey didn’t look back.
She ran.
Footsteps followed.
Fast.
She reached the second-floor landing.
A hand caught the back of her jacket.
Audrey twisted and slammed her elbow backward.
A man cursed.
She broke free.
He grabbed again.
This time Audrey screamed.
A door opened nearby.
An elderly neighbor stepped out holding a baseball bat.
“What the hell?”
The intruder released Audrey and ran back toward the opposite stairwell.
Audrey saw only black clothing and a hood.
Then he disappeared.
Three minutes later, two Ashford security vehicles arrived.
Dorian was inside the second.
He stepped out before it stopped completely.
Audrey had never seen him move that quickly.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
He checked anyway.
Hands on her shoulders.
Then her arms.
“Dorian.”
“Did he touch you?”
“I’m fine.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“No.”
His jaw was clenched so tightly she could see the muscle moving.
“Where?”
“Rear stairwell.”
Dorian turned toward his men.
“No.”
Audrey caught his arm.
He looked down at her hand.
“You’re not hunting somebody through my building.”
“He attacked you.”
“And police can handle that.”
His expression made his opinion of that idea clear.
“Dorian.”
Something in her voice stopped him.
She released his arm.
“I don’t want another person hurt because of me.”
He stared at her.
Then nodded once.
“Call the police,” he told his security chief.
It was a concession.
Audrey understood that.
Inside the apartment, nothing had been stolen.
The television remained.
Her laptop remained.
Forty dollars in emergency cash still sat inside a coffee tin.
But every drawer had been opened.
Her mattress had been cut.
Books emptied from shelves.
Closet searched.
They had been looking for something.
On her kitchen table rested the folded drawing of the wolf.
Audrey’s breath caught.
“I left this at the hospital.”
Dorian put on gloves before touching it.
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
The paper was still wrinkled from river water.
Someone had placed it carefully in the center of the table.
On the back were six words written in black marker.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LEFT HIM THERE.
Dorian became very still.
Audrey felt sick.
“They think Caleb told me something.”
“Yes.”
“He hasn’t.”
“I know.”
“What are they looking for?”
Dorian unfolded the picture.
“A reason he had this.”
“It’s a child’s drawing.”
“Maybe.”
Audrey studied the wet pencil marks.
The wolf had seemed random before.
Now something caught her attention.
There were numbers beneath one of its paws.
Faint.
Almost erased by water.
“Wait.”
Dorian leaned closer.
“What?”
“That.”
Four digits.
3-1-7-9.
“Does that mean anything?”
Dorian shook his head.
Audrey turned the paper beneath the kitchen light.
Another faint mark appeared.
A shape resembling a rectangle.
Inside it was a smaller number.
12.
“A room?”
“Could be.”
“Warehouse?”
Dorian looked at her.
“What?”
“You own warehouses.”
His expression changed.
“Thirty-one seventy-nine could be an address.”
He called someone.
Less than a minute later, his security team had an answer.
3179 Riverport Avenue.
Audrey watched Dorian listen.
“What’s there?”
He ended the call.
“One of my warehouses.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What does number twelve mean?”
“Storage bay twelve.”
Dorian looked again at the drawing.
“Caleb didn’t draw these numbers.”
“How do you know?”
“Because that handwriting belonged to his mother.”
Audrey stared.
“Elena?”
Dorian nodded.
“She used to hide notes inside Caleb’s drawings when he was little. Grocery reminders. Phone numbers. Things she didn’t want to forget.”
“But she died four years ago.”
“Yes.”
“Then why would an old drawing lead to one of your warehouses?”
Dorian’s eyes darkened.
“I don’t know.”
Audrey looked at the threatening message.
“Somebody else knows.”
Dorian folded the drawing carefully.
“You’re coming back to the house.”
Audrey started to protest.
“No.”
She stared.
“I’m not asking.”
“That sentence is exactly why people find you terrifying.”
“Good.”
“This isn’t funny.”
“I’m not joking.”
He moved closer.
“You were nearly dragged into a stairwell because somebody thinks you possess something connected to my son.”
“I understand.”
“No. You understand intellectually.”
His voice dropped.
“I understand what people like this do.”
Audrey saw something in his expression that frightened her.
Not anger.
Experience.
“You’ve done things like this?”
Dorian looked away.
It was answer enough.
Audrey swallowed.
“Who are you really?”
“The man whose son you saved.”
“That’s not enough anymore.”
“No.”
He looked back at her.
“You deserve the truth.”
“When?”
“When you’re somewhere I can keep you alive long enough to hear it.”
Audrey should have refused.
Instead, twenty minutes later, she packed a bag.
At the mansion, Caleb was waiting in the foyer.
He saw Audrey and ran toward her.
She hugged him tightly.
“You came back.”
“I did.”
“Because Dad made you?”
Audrey looked over his head at Dorian.
“Partly.”
Caleb smiled.
That night, after he fell asleep, Audrey and Dorian went to Warehouse 3179.
Storage bay twelve had not been opened officially in nine years.
The lock was covered in rust.
Dorian broke it.
Inside were old filing boxes.
A chair.
A broken desk.
And on the wall—
dozens of photographs.
Dorian.
Elena.
Caleb as a baby.
Adrian.
Employees.
Cars.
Restaurants.
Schedules.
Routes.
Audrey slowly stepped inside.
“This isn’t storage.”
“No.”
Dorian’s voice was nearly inaudible.
“It’s surveillance.”
One photograph had been circled repeatedly in red.
Elena Ashford standing beside her car.
On the date written beneath it—
the day she died.
And beside the photograph, someone had written three words.
FIRST ACCIDENT FAILED.
Audrey looked at Dorian.
His face had gone completely white.
For four years, Dorian Ashford had believed his wife died because of rain and a dangerous road.
May you like
Now someone had left him proof that her death had been planned.
And whoever killed Elena had just tried to finish the job with her son.
