Chapter 15 - THE CROFT FILE
The live feed did not show Daniel's location.
That was the first thing the investigators confirmed.
The camera signal reached Camilla's hidden room through an encrypted relay.
Its source could have been across Chicago or across the country.
Adeline stared at the screen anyway.
Daniel was alive.
For the second time in less than twelve hours, she could see him and could not reach him.
The red number three behind his chair became the only clue she could think about.
“Can you trace it?”
The investigator shook her head.
“Not quickly.”
“Then what can you do?”
“We can preserve the system and analyze the network logs.”
“How long?”
The investigator did not answer directly.
Adeline understood.
Too long.
Enzo watched the feed.
“What kind of room has a painted number three on concrete?”
Matteo, standing beside the SUV, leaned toward the tablet.
“Storage facility.”
“Parking structure.”
“Warehouse bay.”
“Old industrial building.”
Adeline looked at him.
“C3.”
Everyone turned.
She pointed at the wall.
“Maybe we keep assuming C3 means a person or an office.”
“What if Daniel is showing us the number because it connects to the code?”
Enzo looked at the image again.
“C could mean a building section.”
Matteo nodded slowly.
“Sector C, room three.”
The investigator interrupted.
“We are not basing a rescue on a painted number.”
Enzo looked at her.
“No.”
“But we can use it to narrow possibilities.”
The state team began imaging Camilla's computers.
The hidden room contained twenty-three folders arranged by family name.
Marchetti occupied three shelves.
Hale had one.
Price had one.
Voss had two.
Croft had an entire drawer.
When the investigator carried the Croft folder downstairs, Adeline's hands shook.
She was permitted to view only material directly relevant to her or Daniel while the search remained active.
The first pages contained photographs of Thomas Croft leaving the Marchetti estate nine years earlier.
The second group showed Daniel at libraries, city records offices, and outside the Ashford Foundation headquarters.
The third group showed Adeline.
At work.
At her apartment.
Buying groceries.
Standing beside her father's grave.
The photographs went back six months.
Adeline felt physically sick.
Camilla had known who she was long before the engagement party.
“She knew I applied for the maid position.”
Enzo's voice was cold.
“Yes.”
“She let me into the house anyway.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Matteo looked at the surveillance photographs.
“To see what you would find.”
Adeline stared at him.
“You think I was bait.”
“Possibly.”
“For whom?”
Enzo answered.
“Daniel.”
The idea settled horribly into place.
Camilla had allowed Adeline into the Marchetti estate because she believed Daniel was alive and watching his sister.
If Adeline found something important, Daniel might reveal himself to protect her.
He had.
At Union Station.
Then again at Lower Wacker.
Adeline's face went pale.
“I led them to him.”
“No,” Enzo said.
She turned on him.
“I took the job.”
“I searched the house.”
“I found the locker.”
“He called me.”
“And they took him because of me.”
“You do not know when they captured him.”
“I saw him in the van.”
“That does not mean you caused it.”
Adeline laughed bitterly.
“You are very generous with uncertainty when it protects me.”
Enzo absorbed the accusation.
“Maybe.”
She looked away.
The investigator opened another sleeve from the Croft file.
Inside was a photocopy of Thomas Croft's original audit notes.
Adeline leaned forward.
Her father's handwriting covered the margins.
North Meridian is not receiving money.
It is passing money.
Final beneficiary unknown.
Ask Bell about C3.
Do not use company phones.
One note had been underlined twice.
S.M. may not know.
Enzo stared at the initials.
Salvatore Marchetti.
Adeline looked at him.
“My father thought yours might be innocent.”
“Might.”
“That is more than your father gave him.”
“Yes.”
Enzo did not defend Salvatore.
The next page was dated one day before Thomas disappeared.
Met M.A. tonight.
She confirmed Victor controls V4 and H2.
She says P9 is frightened and can be turned.
She has the second key.
If anything happens, give everything to M.B.
Adeline read the initials.
“M.A.”
Enzo looked at her.
“Margaret Ashford.”
Camilla's mother had been working with Thomas.
The room seemed to tilt.
Victor's wife had not been helping him.
She had been trying to expose him.
Adeline read the line again.
“She confirmed Victor controls V4 and H2.”
“V4 is Voss,” Matteo said.
“H2 is Hale.”
“P9 is Price.”
Enzo's jaw tightened.
“Margaret knew all of them.”
The investigator turned another page.
A photograph fell onto the table.
It showed Margaret Ashford and Thomas Croft sitting inside a diner.
A newspaper visible beside them dated the image nine years earlier.
Three weeks before Thomas disappeared.
On the back, Thomas had written:
She thinks Victor suspects her.
Adeline closed her eyes.
“Her boating accident was three years before my father disappeared.”
Enzo frowned.
“That cannot be right.”
Matteo checked dates.
Then his face changed.
“The newspaper in the photograph.”
Enzo picked it up.
The date was clear.
Margaret Ashford had supposedly been dead for nearly three years when the photograph was taken.
Adeline stared.
“She survived.”
“Or the date is wrong,” the investigator said.
Enzo shook his head.
“That headline ran the week my father sold the South Loop property.”
“I remember it.”
“The date is right.”
Adeline looked at the photograph again.
“Then Victor lied about her death.”
“Maybe Margaret did,” Matteo said.
They all turned.
“What?”
“If she believed Victor suspected her, disappearing may have been the only way to survive.”
Adeline's pulse quickened.
“Then she could still be alive.”
No one answered.
The investigator returned to the hidden room.
Enzo, Adeline, and Matteo remained beside the SUV.
Morning traffic moved along the street as if nothing in the world had changed.
Adeline stared at the photograph of Margaret.
“What did she mean by second key?”
Enzo looked at the brass key from Union Station.
“Maybe not a physical key.”
“Bell had the code sheet.”
“Thomas had the company records.”
“Margaret may have had something else.”
Matteo's phone rang.
He checked the number.
His face tightened.
“It's my mother.”
Enzo looked surprised.
“At this hour?”
“She saw the news.”
Matteo answered.
“Ma.”
He listened.
His expression changed slowly.
“What letter?”
Adeline and Enzo exchanged a look.
Matteo turned away from them.
“When did you get it?”
Another pause.
“No, do not open the door for anyone.”
“I am coming.”
He ended the call.
Enzo stepped closer.
“What happened?”
Matteo looked shaken.
“My mother received a letter this morning.”
“From whom?”
“She says it is from my father.”
Adeline's breath caught.
“What does it say?”
“She has not opened it.”
“Why not?”
“Because there is something written on the front.”
Matteo swallowed.
“What?” Enzo asked.
Matteo looked at the red number three behind Daniel on the live feed.
The same symbol had been drawn on the envelope.
A capital C.
Beside it, the number 3.
C3.
Matteo asked his mother to photograph the unopened envelope before touching it again.
Rosa responded with a message that contained three words.
STOP ORDERING ME.
Even Enzo smiled.
The humor lasted seconds.
The live feed of Daniel remained on the investigator's tablet.
He shifted in the chair and looked toward something outside the camera frame.
Then he deliberately moved his foot against the floor three times.
Adeline leaned closer.
“Did you see that?”
“What?”
“He tapped three times.”
Matteo watched the replay.
Daniel moved again.
Three taps.
Pause.
One tap.
Pause.
Three taps.
Adeline's heart accelerated.
“That is our childhood code.”
Enzo looked at her.
“What does it mean?”
“We used knocks through the bedroom wall when our parents thought we were asleep.”
“Three-one-three means listen.”
The investigator increased the audio.
At first they heard only a ventilation fan.
Then a distant metallic sound.
A horn.
Another horn answered several seconds later.
Matteo frowned.
“Freight yard.”
Enzo looked at the painted concrete.
“Industrial storage near rail.”
Adeline's eyes widened.
“Calumet has rail spurs.”
They did not yet know Carlo's letter would name the same place.
But Daniel was already trying to lead them there.
The investigator documented the sound pattern and sent it for comparison against industrial sites.
Adeline stared at her brother's face on the screen.
He looked exhausted.
But his eyes were alert.
He knew the camera existed.
He knew someone might be watching.
And he was using that surveillance against the people who installed it.
For the first time since seeing him bound in the van, Adeline felt something besides fear.
Pride.
Daniel had not simply survived four months.
He had kept thinking.
Enzo looked at her.
“He is like you.”
Adeline did not take it as a compliment.
“He is worse.”
“Good.”
“Why good?”
“Because the people holding him think restraints make him powerless.”
Enzo looked at the three taps on the replay.
“They are making the same mistake Camilla made with you.”
Adeline's face hardened.
May you like
“They think the person in the weaker position is the person who matters least.”
“And that,” Enzo said, “may be the mistake that ends them.”
