Chapter 1 - The Door Behind the Wall
"Dad... open that wall!"
Lily's voice hit me before I even reached the storage room.
I had come home early because a meeting downtown collapsed after our lender backed out. I was angry, wet from the rain, and already rehearsing a conversation with Vanessa about why she had ignored three calls from me.
Then I heard my daughter screaming.
I found Vanessa with both arms around Lily's waist, dragging her backward across the floor. Lily kicked, twisted, and reached toward a huge walnut wardrobe that had belonged to my grandfather.
"Let me go!" Lily cried. "Dad! Behind the wall!"
Vanessa clamped a hand over her mouth.
That was the moment everything in me changed.
"Take your hand off her."
Vanessa spun around. "Daniel, this is not what it looks like."
I crossed the room in three steps, pulled Lily behind me, and slapped Vanessa's hand away when she reached for her again.
"Don't touch her."
Vanessa stared at me as if I had struck her.
Lily buried her face against my back.
"Sweetheart," I said, keeping my eyes on Vanessa, "what's behind the wall?"
Lily pointed at the wardrobe.
"The knocking. And the lady who sings Mom's song."
My chest tightened.
Lily's mother, Claire, had been missing for three years.
The police said she went into the Ohio River after her car broke through a guardrail south of the city. They never found her body, but they found her coat caught in branches downstream.
For two years, Lily asked when her mother was coming home.
Then Vanessa entered our lives.
Vanessa had been Claire's closest friend.
At least, that was what she told me.
I shoved the wardrobe sideways.
It scraped across the floor, revealing a patch of wall a shade lighter than the rest.
Fresh plaster.
"Daniel, stop," Vanessa whispered.
I turned.
For the first time since I had known her, she looked terrified.
"Why?"
"Because Lily shouldn't be here."
"That's not an answer."
I grabbed the framing hammer from the maintenance shelf.
Vanessa lunged for my arm.
"If you open that, you cannot close it again."
I swung.
The first strike cracked the plaster.
The second punched through drywall.
The third exposed steel.
A narrow metal door had been built inside the wall.
No handle on our side. Only a keypad and a small red light.
I looked at Vanessa.
"What is this?"
She said nothing.
Then the room went silent.
THUD.
Lily squeezed my hand.
THUD.
Vanessa backed away.
THUD.
I put my ear against the steel.
A woman's voice came through the door, weak and hoarse.
"Daniel?"
Every hair on my arms rose.
I knew that voice.
I had heard it say my name at our wedding.
I had heard it whisper beside me in the dark.
I had heard it in my dreams for three years.
"Claire?"
Lily began sobbing.
From behind the steel came one more sentence.
"Don't let Vanessa open the door."
---
The next chapters are on the left side of your screen.
If you enjoyed the story, bookmark my site: https://vibe.treeiq.biz
May you like
New stories are posted daily, so check back for updates.
