Chapter 9 - Traces of the Missing
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I stood in the center of my new living room, the disconnected phone pressed against my chest, my heart hammering like a trapped bird.
He worked for my engineering firm six months before I disappeared.
The words echoed through my brain, shattering the timeline of my life. I remembered the night I met Julian five years ago at a fundraising dinner for green architecture. He had walked up to my table carrying two glasses of white wine, smiling with an easy, boyish charm that had instantly made me feel safe in the dark wake of my father's disappearance.
He had told me he was an independent financial analyst. He had told me he had never heard of my father's firm, Vance Dynamics.
It was all a lie. A meticulously constructed, five-year performance.
I grabbed my coat, pulled a wide-brimmed hat over my head bandages, and took a taxi directly to the climate-controlled storage facility in Long Island City where I had placed my father’s personal office furniture six years ago.
The facility was quiet, smelling of concrete and dust. I unlocked Unit 408, rolling up the heavy corrugated metal door.
Inside sat my father's heavy executive mahogany desk, wrapped in protective plastic. I tore away the plastic, pulled open the center drawer, and reached my hand deep into the back cavity, feeling along the smooth underside of the wooden frame.
My fingers brushed against a small, magnetic metal box taped to the top framework.
May you like
I pulled it free and opened the slide lid.
Inside lay a silver thumb drive and a rusted iron key stamped with a three-digit number: 714.
