Chapter 9
None appeared.
That frightened her more than if they had.
Nico never allowed uncertainty to remain unattended.
If he knew she was gone, he would already be searching.
If he did not know, then the penthouse was still asleep around the space where she had been.
She wondered which possibility hurt more.
At 8:42 a.m., her old phone rang again.
This time, the caller ID displayed a number she knew by heart.
Nico.
Norah stared at it.
Mara reached for her hand.
“Don’t answer.”
The phone continued ringing.
Norah imagined him standing in the bedroom, looking at the untouched diamonds.
She imagined Arthur beside him, silent and grim.
She imagined Nico saying her name with anger because anger was easier for him than fear.
The ringing stopped.
A message appeared.
Come home.
A second message followed.
I need to speak with you.
Norah read both without blinking.
Then a third message arrived.
Please.
The single word weakened something in her chest.
Nico had never said please when he believed he had the right to command.
She placed the phone face down.
Mara watched her.
“You still love him.”
Norah turned toward the window.
“Yes.”
The admission was quiet, but it did not feel like surrender.
“I love him,” she said, “and I am still not going back.”
The bus passed beneath an overpass covered in peeling posters.
For the first time since leaving the penthouse, Norah felt the ground beneath her become steady.
Bell Street was narrower than she remembered.
The old catering kitchen stood between a locksmith and a closed tailor shop, its brick façade stained by decades of weather.
A faded sign still carried her mother’s name.
Norah’s throat tightened at the sight of it.
Mara touched her elbow.
“You don’t have to do this today.”
“Yes, I do.”
The front door was locked, but the brass key opened a side entrance beneath the stairs.
Inside, the air smelled of dust, old wood, and the faint sweetness of flour absorbed into the walls.
Norah found the basement door at the back of the kitchen.
The key fit the lock.
Before she turned it, she noticed a narrow strip of blue paint along the doorframe.
The same shade as the thread on her gray hoodie.
Her mother had marked the entrance.
Norah pushed the door open.
A staircase descended into darkness.
Mara switched on the light.
One bulb flickered overhead.