“Yes?” she answered. There was a long pause. “Yes, we have the package… No, there was an unexpected problem… We found something else… No, not by phone… Okay. In an hour. At the usual place.”
He hung up.
“Pack everything up,” he said, returning to his commanding tone. “We have to go. The Buyer wants to see us first.”
“What do we do with the photos?” Leo asked.
—We’ll take them. And the crowbar too. If the guy from ’42 was following us, we’re going to have to pay him a special visit tonight.
“Tonight?” Sarah squealed. “But my parents…!”
—Your parents will think you’re sleeping at Emma’s, like always. Move it! Now!
The frenzy of movement resumed. Young hands picking up loot from the floor, the sound of zippers closing, the clinking of jewelry disappearing into backpacks.
“Wait,” said the boy in boots suddenly. “I’ve dropped an earring.” He rolled over.
I saw a large, calloused hand reach down to the floor. Into the darkness beneath the bed.
My lungs burned from lack of air. I pressed myself against the back wall, drawing my legs up as much as I could, praying that the shadows would be enough.
My hand felt across the carpet. My fingers brushed against a wisp of fluff just inches from my nose. If I moved my head, he’d see me. If I breathed heavily, he’d hear me.
“Do you have it or not?” Lily grumbled from the doorway.
—I don’t see it… wait.
The boy’s fingers moved a little further. They brushed against the fabric of my sleeve.
I froze, waiting for the scream, waiting for the discovery. My mind, in an act of desperation, was already calculating how to get out, how to confront three teenagers, how to explain why I was spying on my own daughter.
“Leave it alone!” Lily ordered. “It’s just a trinket. Let’s go, we’re late.”
The hand stopped. It hesitated for a second. The fingers closed into a fist and withdrew.
—Okay, okay. I’m coming.
The boy stood up. I watched the boots walk away.
“Let’s go through the back door,” Lily said. “And wipe your shoes on the carpet before you go out. If my mother sees mud in the hall, she’ll be furious about cleaning it.”
The irony of her comment almost made me burst out laughing hysterically. She was worried I’d get angry about the mud, not about the fact that she was the head of a criminal gang.
They left the room. I heard their footsteps coming down the stairs, this time faster, less cautious. I heard the back door open and close. The click of the automatic lock.
And then, silence.
A dense, heavy silence that felt like a slab on my chest.
I waited a full two minutes. Then five. Only when I was absolutely sure they were gone did I dare to exhale. The air left my lungs in a ragged sob.
I crawled out from under the bed like a wounded animal. My limbs were numb, but I felt no physical pain. My mind was shattered.
I stood up and looked around the room. It was the same as before. Spotless. Tidy. A model child’s room. But now, every stuffed animal, every book on the shelf, seemed like a lie. A set designed to deceive me.
My gaze fell to the floor, where the boy had been searching for the earring. There, half-hidden by the bed leg, lay a scrap of paper. It must have fallen from the folder when Lily snatched it from Leo.
I bent down and picked it up with trembling hands. It was a photograph printed on ordinary paper.
In the grainy image, taken from a distance with a telephoto lens, Lily was visible. She was standing on a street corner, talking to a tall man who had his back to the camera. The man was wearing a long gray coat. But what made my heart stop wasn’t the man.
That’s what Lily was holding in her hand in the photo.
A gun.
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