Chapter 6 - A Photograph in the Garden
Glass shattered.
Adrian dragged Sofia behind an engine block.
Marcus pulled Emma down.
A second shot struck the wall.
“Back exit!” Marcus shouted.
Adrian fired toward the rooftop opposite them.
The sniper disappeared.
They escaped through Daniel's old office.
Outside, two Moretti vehicles arrived.
Adrian refused to separate from Sofia and Emma.
Back at the estate, Marcus confronted him.
“Price told you not to trust me.”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“And Charles wants us divided.”
Marcus nodded.
That was enough.
Fifteen years of loyalty did not disappear because of one phone call.
Sofia took Emma to the garden.
Adrian followed later.
He found them beside the patch Emma had been watering.
Tiny green shoots had appeared.
Sunflowers.
Emma smiled proudly.
“They didn't give up.”
Adrian crouched beside her.
“No.”
“Claire would've liked them.”
“Yes.”
Emma pushed soil around one shoot.
“Then they're hers too.”
Adrian turned away quickly.
Sofia saw the tears he refused to show.
“You don't have to hide it.”
He looked at her.
“Hide what?”
“Missing her.”
For years everyone around Adrian had been afraid to say Claire's name.
Sofia said it without fear.
“You think grief makes you weak,” she said.
“No.”
“You act like it does.”
Adrian stared at the garden.
“If I start, I don't know if I'll stop.”
“Start what?”
“Feeling it.”
Sofia sat beside him.
“Maybe stopping isn't the point.”
Their eyes met.
Something quiet passed between them.
Not romance.
Not yet.
Recognition.
Two people who understood empty chairs.
Emma interrupted by placing dirt on Adrian's polished shoe.
“Oops.”
Sofia laughed.
Adrian stared at his shoe.
Emma looked terrified.
Then Adrian deliberately stepped into the mud.
Emma giggled.
The sound hit him harder than grief.
Claire's laughter lived somewhere inside it.
For one second, Adrian laughed too.
Everyone nearby stopped moving.
Rosa dropped a spoon inside the kitchen.
Marcus stared through the window.
Stone had laughed.
That evening, Adrian ordered Sofia's debts paid.
When she discovered it, she marched into his office.
“You can't do that.”
“I already did.”
“I don't want charity.”
“It isn't.”
“What is it?”
“Three years of wages your husband should've lived to earn.”
“That money isn't yours to give.”
Adrian stood.
“Then call it restitution.”
Her anger softened.
“You can't buy forgiveness.”
“I know.”
That answer stopped her.
Adrian looked at her.
“I am not asking you to forgive me.”
Sofia realized he meant it.
He wanted only to repair what he could.
Later, Marcus arrived with news.
Samuel Price had vanished.
His office had been emptied.
But his secretary had found a hidden safe.
Inside was a list of payments.
One payment occurred every November 14.
Recipient: Charles Bennett.
Another went to someone identified only as E.M.
Adrian stared at the initials.
Elena Moretti.
Impossible.
Then Marcus placed a photograph beside the ledger.
Elena was alive in the photograph.
The timestamp was six hours after the bombing.
Adrian's face drained of color.
“No.”
Sofia covered her mouth.
The woman in the image had Elena's coat.
Elena's hair.
Elena's face.
Marcus enlarged it.
Adrian stepped closer.
Three years of certainty shattered.
If the timestamp was real, then Elena had survived the explosion.
“Where was this taken?”
“Union Station.”
Adrian whispered her name.
“Elena.”
Then Marcus turned the photograph over.
Someone had written an address.
Sofia recognized it.
“That’s Mrs. Bellini's building.”
Adrian looked at her.
“What?”
“The apartment below mine.”
The apartment had supposedly been empty for years.
Adrian drove there immediately.
The door was locked.
He broke it.
Inside was dust.
A chair.
A table.
And hundreds of photographs covering the walls.
Photographs of Adrian.
Sofia.
Emma.
Claire.
Daniel.
Elena.
At the center was a recent photograph.
Taken three days earlier.
It showed Emma watering the sunflowers.
Adrian moved closer.
There was writing beneath it.
SHE LOOKS LIKE CLAIRE.
A floorboard creaked behind him.
Adrian turned.
May you like
The closet door began to open.
And a woman's voice whispered his name.
