Chapter 12 - The Shoreline Hotel
The abandoned hotel looked dead from the road, but fresh tire tracks cut behind its boarded windows.
Nicholas stayed in the armored SUV while Vincent's team cleared the first floor. Hannah hated it, but the wheelchair made silence impossible.
Then Vincent radioed.
"We found medical equipment."
Nicholas went in.
Room 214 contained a hospital bed, IV stand, locked medicine cabinet, and restraints bolted beneath the mattress.
No Rebecca.
Hundreds of pencil marks covered the wall in seven rows. Hannah touched the last one. "She counted the days."
Nicholas stared until his eyes went wet.
He turned away before anyone could see.
In the bathroom they found a broken silver cross.
Rebecca's.
Then Hannah noticed a paper crane beneath the bed.
She froze.
"That isn't hers."
Nicholas looked at her.
Hannah picked it up.
Crooked wings. One side folded too short.
Ethan's cranes always looked like that.
Her phone was already in her hand.
She called her neighbor in Berwyn.
No answer.
Called Ethan.
Straight to voicemail.
Her chest tightened.
Then a text arrived from Ethan's number.
A photograph.
Ethan sat in a chair beside a woman with dark hair streaked with gray.
Rebecca.
Both looked frightened.
Behind them stood a man whose face was hidden.
The message read:
BRING NICHOLAS ALONE. OLD UNION TERMINAL. 8 PM.
NO POLICE.
Hannah nearly dropped the phone.
Nicholas read the message.
"They took your brother because of me."
"They took him because they think I matter to you."
Nicholas looked at her.
"You do."
Neither had time to react to the sentence.
Walter called from the estate.
His voice was urgent.
"Nicholas, Claire is gone."
"How?"
"The guard outside her room is unconscious."
Nicholas looked again at the photograph of Ethan and Rebecca.
Two hostages.
One missing fiancee.
And a deadline three hours away.
Then Hannah zoomed in on the image.
Rebecca was holding something against her leg.
May you like
A key.
And carved into it was the Valenti crest.
