Chapter 3 - TEN YEARS OF UNANSWERED LETTERS|
At six the next morning, Elena sat at her kitchen table with a mug of coffee she had forgotten to drink.
Her apartment was small, above a bakery that began work before sunrise. The windows rattled when the wind came off the river, and the radiator made a sound like someone dragging a chair across the floor.
It was not the life she had imagined when Matthew disappeared.
But it was hers.
On the table lay a wooden box containing ten years of letters.
The first was dated December 12, the day after he vanished. The second had been written on Christmas Eve. There were letters for birthdays, anniversaries, New Year's mornings, and nights when she had been too lonely to pretend she was fine.
She had sent them to every address she could find.
Some came back unopened.
Others disappeared.
A few had no forwarding information at all.
The last letter, written three years earlier, contained only one sentence.
I don't know whether you're alive, but I hope you know someone still remembers who you were before the world made you afraid.
Elena opened the wooden box.
At the bottom lay a photograph of her father, Michael Ross, standing outside his little Hudson Valley clinic. He had one arm around Elena, who was twenty years old and laughing at something beyond the camera.
On the back, her father had written: A good heart is not a weakness, sweetheart. It is a responsibility.
Michael had died seven years ago after a sudden stroke.
Before he died, he had asked Elena to promise something.
“If that young man ever comes back,” he had said, struggling to breathe, “don't let his enemies use your love to hurt him.”
At the time, Elena had thought the request was strange.
Now she wondered whether her father had known more about Matthew than he had ever admitted.
Her phone rang.
The caller ID showed an unfamiliar Manhattan number.
She nearly ignored it.
“Hello?”
“Ms. Ross? This is Daniel Price. I'm calling on behalf of Mr. Moretti.”
“I have nothing to say to Mr. Moretti.”
“I understand. But he would like to arrange a meeting.”
“Tell him the answer is no.”
There was a pause.
“He believes the ring may be connected to a matter involving his family.”
Elena looked at the black diamond.
“Then he should ask his family.”
“His family has been searching for that ring for ten years.”
The words chilled her.
“Why?”
“I’m not authorized to discuss that over the phone.”
“Then you’re not authorized to waste my time.”
She ended the call.
For several minutes, she sat motionless.
The ring had been a promise. A keepsake. The last tangible piece of a man she had loved with the reckless certainty of someone who believed love could survive anything.
Now it appeared to be connected to something dangerous.
Elena opened the wooden box again and pulled out a folded piece of paper she had not looked at in years.
It was a note Matthew had written during his recovery.
If anything happens to me, don't trust anyone who says they are protecting you. Ask who benefits from your silence.
At the bottom was a small drawing of two intertwined serpents.
The same symbol carved into her ring.
Elena's fingers began to tremble.
Someone had known what that ring meant long before Adrian Moretti walked into her clinic.
And if Adrian truly did not remember her, then someone had either stolen ten years from his memory or made certain he would never be allowed to reclaim them.
She looked toward the window.
A black SUV sat across the street.
Its engine was running.
A man behind the wheel was watching her building.
May you like
When Elena moved toward the curtain, the SUV pulled away.
For the first time in ten years, she wondered whether Matthew's disappearance had ever been a choice.
