Chapter 11 - Someone Was Already Watching
Marcus slowly lowered the phone from his ear.
The call had lasted less than ten seconds, yet it changed the atmosphere inside the inspection room more than every document they had uncovered so far.
"They know the suitcase is open," Marcus said quietly.
Dana looked up immediately.
"Who called?"
"I don't know."
"Did they identify themselves?"
Marcus shook his head.
"Just an older man's voice."
The lead detective immediately requested the airport communications center to trace the internal extension. Less than a minute later, the reply came back.
"There is no active extension matching that call."
Marcus frowned.
"That's impossible."
"So is receiving a call from an internal line that doesn't exist," the communications officer answered.
Across the room, Victor had become unusually calm.
Too calm.
Marcus noticed it at once.
Only moments earlier Victor had appeared anxious, constantly watching the evidence table. Now he leaned casually against the wall, almost as if he were waiting for something.
Marcus walked toward him.
"You don't seem surprised."
Victor smiled faintly.
"Should I be?"
"You've been trying to get that box since you arrived."
"And now I know I can't."
Marcus studied his face.
Victor wasn't giving up.
He was buying time.
Meanwhile, Eleanor carefully unfolded another bundle from inside the suitcase. Wrapped in soft white cloth was an old silver pocket watch. The chain had broken years ago, but the watch itself remained polished.
Dana looked at it curiously.
"Another family keepsake?"
Eleanor nodded.
"My husband never traveled without it."
Marcus accepted the watch carefully.
The second hand had stopped permanently at exactly 8:47.
Coincidence?
Perhaps.
Still, after everything they had discovered, Marcus no longer believed in coincidences.
He pressed the release button.
The back cover opened.
Inside wasn't a photograph.
It wasn't an engraving either.
Someone had hidden an impossibly thin piece of folded paper beneath the mechanism.
Marcus removed it with tweezers.
The paper contained only numbers.
8 – 47 – C
North Storage
Locker 118
Dana immediately turned toward the detective.
"Does North Storage still exist?"
The detective hesitated.
"It was scheduled for demolition years ago."
"Scheduled?"
"It never happened."
Marcus looked toward Eleanor.
"Did Daniel ever mention Locker 118?"
She closed her eyes, searching memories buried beneath twelve years of grief.
Finally, she whispered,
"He once told Samuel that if anything happened to Grandpa's watch... then it was finally time to visit the place where memories were stored."
Marcus looked at Dana.
"I don't think he meant memories."
Dana nodded.
"I think he meant evidence."
Before anyone could continue, every monitor inside the inspection room flickered.
The lights dimmed for less than two seconds.
Emergency power immediately restored them.
When the lights stabilized again, Marcus instinctively looked toward the evidence table.
The sealed envelope with the blue wax crest...
May you like
...was gone.
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