Chapter 1
“So my wife never abandoned me. Take me to her—right now.”
My hand hovered over the seam in the stone wall.
Vivienne stopped breathing.
Audrey stood beside me in wet sandals with her cardigan wrapped around her shoulders, one tiny hand still gripping the faded blue bracelet on her wrist. Mrs. Keller had gone white.
That mattered.
I looked at her.
“You know this wall.”
She swallowed.
“Yes.”
Vivienne immediately snapped, “She doesn’t know anything.”
I turned my head.
Nobody had asked her.
Mrs. Keller looked at Audrey, then at me.
“That panel was sealed after Mrs. Moretti disappeared.”
My chest tightened.
“Sealed by whom?”
Silence.
Damian groaned somewhere behind us beneath the collapsed croquet rack.
I did not look away from Keller.
“Who?”
“Mr. Hale arranged it.”
Damian.
Of course.
Vivienne’s eyes hardened.
“It was damaged. That’s all.”
Audrey tugged my sleeve.
“Daddy.”
I crouched.
“What did Mommy show you?”
She pointed at the bracelet.
“Blue goes blue.”
I looked at the stones.
Nothing blue.
Then Audrey pressed the bracelet against a tiny faded tile beside the seam.
A soft click came from inside the wall.
Everyone froze.
I stood.
The panel opened less than an inch.
Cold air slipped through.
Not pool air.
Indoor air.
Stale.
Hidden.
I pulled the panel wider.
Behind it was a narrow passage descending into darkness.
Mrs. Keller covered her mouth.
Vivienne stepped backward.
That reaction told me this was no forgotten architectural feature.
It was something she prayed I would never find.
I looked at her.
“How long?”
She said nothing.
I turned toward the darkness.
Three years of believing Natalie walked out.
Three years of replaying the final note.
Three years of wondering what I failed to see.
May you like
Now there was a door inside my own wall.
And my daughter knew how to open it.
