Chapter 10 - THE FATHER WHO WAS NEVER DEADThe voice echoed again.
“Come out.”
The boss held the girl close.
Ethan switched off his flashlight.
“Don't move.”
Footsteps entered the hidden room.
One.
Two.
Three.
Then silence.
The boss could hear the girl's breathing.
He could hear his own heartbeat.
A phone rang somewhere in the darkness.
The sound came from inside the room.
Ethan slowly turned.
A black telephone sat on the desk.
It had not been there before.
The boss stared.
The phone rang again.
He answered.
“Hello?”
His father's voice came through.
“Son.”
The boss couldn't speak.
Ethan closed his eyes.
The girl whispered:
“That's Daddy.”
The boss looked at her.
“What?”
“My daddy.”
He turned back toward the phone.
The voice continued.
“You have something that belongs to me.”
“The girl?”
“No.”
A pause.
“The truth.”
The line went dead.
The boss stared at the receiver.
Ethan finally spoke.
“Now you understand.”
“No.”
The boss shook his head.
“I understand nothing.”
Ethan looked toward the girl.
“She was born into the network.”
The boss looked at the child.
“And her father?”
“Was one of its architects.”
The boss's expression hardened.
“Why would he abandon her?”
“He didn't.”
“Then where was he?”
Ethan looked toward the ceiling.
“Watching.”
The boss stepped back.
A hidden speaker crackled.
The same voice returned.
“You have ten minutes.”
A digital timer appeared on the wall.
10:00
The girl looked frightened.
“What happens when it reaches zero?”
Nobody answered.
The boss looked at Ethan.
“What did you bring me into?”
Ethan shook his head.
“You were already inside.”
The timer reached 09:30.
The boss looked at the photographs.
Then he saw something.
A date.
The same date appeared on dozens of documents.
A date eight years in the past.
The night Ethan supposedly died.
The boss remembered the warehouse.
He remembered the locked door.
He remembered hearing a child crying.
He had always assumed it was part of the operation.
But now he knew.
There had been another child there.
The girl.
Only she hadn't been five.
She had been three.
The boss looked at Ethan.
“She was there.”
Ethan nodded.
“And you knew.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because you were being watched.”
“By whom?”
Ethan looked toward the camera hidden above the doorway.
“By your father.”
The boss stared.
The timer reached 08:00.
Then the lights returned.
A video began playing on the wall.
A younger version of the boss appeared.
Standing in the warehouse.
Holding a little girl.
The boss watched himself speak words he had completely forgotten.
“I'll keep her safe.”
The video ended.
The girl looked up at him.
“You promised.”
He slowly knelt.
She reached for his hand.
And for the first time, he remembered.
He had promised her mother.
Not his father.
Not the network.
Her mother.
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He had promised to protect the child.
Then someone had erased the memory.
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