Chapter 4 - The Woman in Apartment 4B
Elena called back eleven times.
No answer.
Adrian ordered his people to lock down the building.
Still no answer from Marco.
By the time they reached Manhattan, Elena had imagined every possible catastrophe.
Marco dead.
Her apartment burning.
A stranger waiting inside.
Her actual sister somehow replaced by someone else.
The absurdity did not make it less terrifying.
Adrian parked two blocks away.
"We go through the garage."
"I'm going through the front."
"No."
"You've said that word to me so many times it's losing meaning."
"Good. Then maybe eventually you'll stop reacting to it."
She opened the car door.
He caught it.
"Elena."
"What?"
"If this woman is involved with Serrano, she may use you."
"I know."
"She may lie."
"I know."
"She may tell you something about your family designed to make you distrust me."
Elena stared.
"Should I?"
Adrian's hand loosened.
"Probably."
That answer unsettled her more than reassurance would have.
They entered through the garage.
Two of Adrian's men waited.
"Marco?"
"Alive."
Elena exhaled.
"Where?"
"Fourth floor."
"What happened?"
"Someone attacked the stairwell team. Marco went after them."
"And the woman?"
"Still in Four-B."
Elena headed for the elevator.
Adrian stayed beside her.
"You don't have to go in first."
"It's my apartment."
"That isn't relevant."
"It is to me."
Fourth floor.
The doors opened.
Marco stood outside 4B with a cut above his eyebrow.
Elena rushed forward.
"You okay?"
"I've had better mornings."
"You screamed."
"That wasn't me."
Her face changed.
Marco pointed inside.
"The woman."
Elena entered.
Her apartment looked violated.
Drawers open.
Couch cushions ripped.
Closet emptied.
Family photographs scattered across the floor.
A woman sat at Elena's kitchen table.
Mid-thirties.
Dark blonde hair.
Thin face.
Bruise along one cheek.
Elena had never seen her before.
The woman looked up.
"Elena."
"Who are you?"
"My name is Claire."
"Marco says you claim to be my sister."
"I am."
"No. My sister's name is Rebecca."
Claire swallowed.
"The woman you call Rebecca is your half-sister."
Elena stared.
"That's still my sister."
"Yes."
"Then what are you?"
Claire's eyes filled.
"Thomas Renner's daughter."
The room seemed to contract.
Elena laughed once.
"You need a better lie."
"I was born two years before your parents married."
"Stop."
"Your father paid my mother every month until he died."
"Stop."
"He visited me three times a year."
"Stop."
Claire reached into her jacket.
Adrian moved instantly.
"Hands where I can see them."
Claire froze.
"I'm getting a photograph."
"Slowly."
She produced an old Polaroid.
Elena took it.
Her father stood beside a little blonde girl.
Claire.
Maybe six.
On the back, Thomas had written:
For my brave Claire. I am sorry you must grow up hidden.
Elena sat down.
She knew her father's handwriting.
"This proves he knew you."
"I have letters."
Claire placed a bundle on the table.
Elena did not touch them.
"Why hidden?"
"Because my mother worked for Gabriel Serrano."
Adrian stepped closer.
Claire looked at him.
"Not willingly."
"Explain."
"She was an accountant. Like Thomas. Serrano discovered she was copying records. Thomas helped her disappear."
Elena's head hurt.
"So Dad..."
"Protected us."
"And had a child with her?"
Claire shook her head.
"No."
Elena stared.
"What?"
"Thomas wasn't my biological father."
Silence.
"He gave me his name because Serrano believed I was his child. It made my mother less valuable as leverage."
Elena leaned back.
"So you're not my sister."
Claire looked hurt.
"Not biologically."
"Then why say you are?"
"Because Thomas raised me as much as he could. He called you my little sister before you were born."
Elena had no response.
Adrian asked, "Why are you here?"
Claire looked at him.
"Because Thomas gave me the third part."
Everyone went still.
"The evidence?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"I don't have it anymore."
Adrian's expression hardened.
"Who does?"
"Gabriel Serrano."
Elena's anger returned.
"You came here to tell us you lost the evidence?"
"No."
Claire looked at Elena.
"I came because Thomas built a trap."
She pointed toward the wall behind Elena's desk.
"There's something inside your apartment nobody found because they were looking for documents."
Marco approached.
"What?"
Claire stood.
"Help me move the desk."
Behind it, she removed an outlet cover.
Inside the wall was a tiny metal cylinder.
She opened it.
A flash drive fell into her palm.
Elena stared.
"How did you know?"
"Thomas showed me years ago."
Adrian held out his hand.
Claire hesitated.
Then gave him the drive.
They plugged it into an offline laptop.
Encrypted.
A password prompt appeared.
Elena frowned.
"Try my birthday."
Wrong.
"Mom's?"
Wrong.
Claire whispered, "Try 0312."
Elena looked at her.
"March twelfth?"
"No."
Adrian went still.
"3:12."
Elena stared.
"The time I came upstairs."
Claire nodded.
"Thomas wrote that number repeatedly in his notes."
Adrian entered it.
The drive unlocked.
Folders appeared.
Hundreds.
Financial ledgers.
Photographs.
Audio.
Video.
Names.
Judges.
Detectives.
Businessmen.
City officials.
Elena felt sick.
"This could destroy people."
"It could destroy half the network," Claire said.
Adrian opened a file labeled VALE.
Inside were payment records signed by Victor.
Then another folder.
ADRIAN.
Elena looked at him.
He hesitated.
Then opened it.
Video footage.
Twenty-two-year-old Adrian walking toward a car.
Three armed men approaching from another street.
Thomas Renner intercepting Adrian seconds before the attack.
Then another video.
Victor Vale sitting at a restaurant with Gabriel Serrano.
Audio began.
Victor's voice: "My son is becoming a liability."
Gabriel: "You want him frightened?"
Victor: "I want him gone."
Adrian's face became unreadable.
Elena reached for his arm.
She stopped before touching him.
Then did anyway.
His eyes moved to her hand.
Neither spoke.
Marco looked away.
Claire opened another document.
"There's more."
A list of payments appeared.
Recent.
Within the last year.
Adrian frowned.
"Victor died six years ago."
"Those accounts are still active," Claire said.
"Someone inherited them."
"Gabriel?"
"Maybe."
Elena noticed one recurring payment.
A name.
Harold Givens.
Her landlord.
Her heart dropped.
"Mr. Givens?"
Adrian looked.
Payments every month.
For five years.
Elena stood.
"He rents the building."
"No," Claire said.
"He owns it."
Elena stared.
"He's owned it since before you moved in."
Adrian's expression changed.
"Why would Serrano pay the owner of Elena's building?"
Nobody answered.
Then Marco said quietly, "Because the building matters."
They pulled property records.
Renovation permits.
Basement diagrams.
Original blueprints.
Adrian zoomed into a foundation plan.
"There."
A sealed sub-basement.
Not listed on modern plans.
Claire whispered, "Thomas's second part."
Elena understood.
Her father had said he placed it where Elena would live without ever knowing.
Not inside her apartment.
Inside the building.
They went downstairs.
Behind the laundry room was an old maintenance corridor.
At the end, a concrete wall showed newer patchwork around one section.
Marco found the hidden latch.
The wall opened inward.
A narrow staircase descended.
Elena looked at Adrian.
"You knew about this?"
"No."
"Comforting."
They went down.
At the bottom was a steel door.
Elena's father had scratched words into the paint.
E.R. ONLY.
Elena touched the letters.
"Me."
Adrian nodded.
There was a biometric scanner.
Impossible for technology nine years old?
But not impossible.
Elena placed her thumb.
Green light.
The door opened.
Inside was a tiny room.
One desk.
One safe.
One photograph.
Elena approached.
It showed Thomas with Miriam.
With baby Elena.
And Adrian, age twenty-two, standing in the background.
She turned toward him.
"You met me?"
"I don't remember that picture."
"But you were there."
"Apparently."
The safe opened with Elena's fingerprint.
Inside lay binders.
Hard drives.
Passports.
And a deed.
Adrian picked it up.
"Elena."
"What?"
He handed it to her.
Property transfer agreement.
Building address.
Owner: Thomas Renner.
Beneficiary: Elena Renner.
Elena stared.
"This building belongs to me?"
"Not legally," Adrian said. "The transfer was never filed."
Another document explained why.
Thomas had purchased the building secretly through a shell company to protect the evidence.
Harold Givens had later forged ownership papers after Thomas died.
Elena's anger rose.
"He stole it."
"Yes."
A phone rang upstairs.
Marco answered his radio.
Then his face changed.
"Boss."
"What?"
"Police are outside."
"How many?"
"Too many."
Elena frowned.
"Good. We show them everything."
Adrian looked at her.
"No."
"Why?"
Marco answered.
"Because the officer leading them is on the drive."
Footsteps thundered above.
Someone shouted.
"Police! Nobody move!"
Adrian closed the safe.
"Back exit?"
Claire pointed toward the far wall.
"There should be one."
They found a narrow tunnel leading toward an adjacent building.
Elena looked back at the hidden room.
"My father's evidence."
"We'll retrieve it," Adrian said.
"What if they destroy it?"
"They won't know where it is."
A gunshot cracked upstairs.
Elena flinched.
Adrian pulled her into the tunnel.
They moved quickly.
At the other end, Marco forced open a metal hatch.
They emerged into the basement of a closed restaurant.
Adrian's men locked the hatch.
Elena leaned against the wall.
"How many police officers were on that list?"
"Seventeen," Claire said.
"And we trust none of them?"
"Not yet."
Adrian's phone buzzed.
A message from an unknown number.
He read it.
Then showed Elena.
A photograph of Miriam Renner sitting at her kitchen table.
Taken seconds ago.
A man stood behind her.
His face remained outside the frame.
The message beneath it read:
BRING ELENA TO ME.
Elena stopped breathing.
Another message appeared.
OR HER MOTHER DIES AT NOON.
Adrian looked at the time.
11:17 a.m.
They had forty-three minutes.
Then Elena's phone rang.
The caller ID showed one name.
MOM.
Elena answered.
A man's voice said:
May you like
"Hello, Elena."
And she finally heard Gabriel Serrano laugh.
