Chapter 2 - Daniel Notices Emma’s Broken Necklace
Daniel kept himself between Victoria and Emma until security arrived.
The crystal glass had shattered against the marble, missing Emma by
inches.
Victoria insisted she had only thrown it toward the wall.
Daniel had seen enough.
“You threw it at a person.”
“She’s staff.”
“That sentence makes this worse, not better.”
Emma stood slowly.
A thin chain had snapped at her neck when she covered her face. A small
silver pendant lay among the glass.
Daniel bent to retrieve it.
Then he froze.
The pendant was shaped like a tiny compass.
On the back were engraved initials:
L.W.
Daniel knew that pendant.
His older sister Laura had worn one exactly like it before she
disappeared twenty-two years earlier.
He looked at Emma.
“Where did you get this?”
Emma’s face drained.
“My mother.”
“What was her name?”
Emma hesitated.
Victoria stared from the staircase.
Daniel repeated the question.
Emma whispered:
“Laura Whitmore.”
The foyer went completely silent.
Daniel’s sister had supposedly died overseas when Daniel was sixteen.
Their father Richard had told the family there was no body to bring
home.
Emma was twenty-four.
Old enough to have been born shortly before Laura vanished.
Daniel looked at her again.
“You’re Laura’s daughter?”
Emma swallowed.
“I think so.”
Victoria suddenly interrupted.
“This is ridiculous.”
Daniel turned.
Victoria was not shocked by the name.
She was afraid of it.
Emma noticed too.
Daniel asked:
“You already knew?”
Victoria stepped backward.
“No.”
But Emma reached into her apron.
She removed a folded photograph.
It showed Laura holding a baby.
Standing beside her was Victoria’s father, Charles Vale.
On the back, Laura had written:
IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, DANIEL MUST KNOW WHAT CHARLES DID.
May you like
Daniel looked at Victoria.
The broken glass was no longer the most dangerous thing in the foyer.
