Not My Name to Forget
Chapter 05 - Not My Name to Forget
Mia was sitting in a chair with her hands in her lap.
There was no blood. No visible injury. Somehow that made the photograph worse, because it meant whoever sent it understood fear did not need decoration.
My sister’s brown hair was shorter than the last time I had seen her. Her chin was lifted, stubborn as ever, but her eyes gave her away. Behind her was a wall painted green, a cheap landscape print, and a lamp shaped like a seashell.
She was alive.
For one breath, that was all I could feel.
Then the second message arrived.
COME ALONE OR SHE DOESN’T.
Lucia read it over my shoulder.
“Rafe,” she said.
“You do not know that.”
“I know my son’s grammar when he is trying not to sound educated.”
A hysterical laugh almost escaped me.
The phone vibrated again.
NO MARINO. NO POLICE. BRING THE MEMORY CARD.
I looked toward the framed photo. Toward the card I had hidden there before I left. My hand went cold when I remembered it was no longer with me.
Nico had it.
Lucia saw my face. “Where is it?”
“In Nico’s bedroom.”
“Then you need him.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“No.” My voice broke hard enough to embarrass me. “Do you know what it is like to love a man who can make you feel safe and disposable in the same day?”
Lucia did not answer quickly.
Then she said, “Yes.”
That quiet yes stopped me.
She sat on the edge of the desk chair as if her bones had finally remembered her age.
“My husband loved power more fluently than people. Rafe learned from him. I stayed too long because leaving meant admitting my life had been built inside a lie. I recognize the expression on your face because I once saw it in my own mirror.”
I swallowed.
“I heard Nico.”
“I know.”
“He said he would forget my name.”
Lucia held my gaze. “Then make him prove he cannot.”
The old phone in her hand rang before I could respond.
She answered without greeting.
“Nico,” she said.
My lungs locked.
Lucia listened, then looked at me. “She is here.”
I shook my head violently.
“No,” I whispered.
Lucia ignored me. “Your cousin found her first. He has her sister.”
The voice on the other end changed. I could not hear words, but I felt the room respond to him.
Lucia handed me the phone.
I stared at it as if it were a knife.
“Take it,” she said.
I did.
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
Then Nico said my name.
Not Claire, as he said it across rooms. Not the clipped version he used when distracted. This was rougher. Smaller.
I hated that my eyes filled.
“Do not,” I said.
A pause.
“Do not what?”
“Say it like it matters now.”
His silence was deserved.
When he spoke again, the control had gone thin around the edges. “I am coming to you.”
“No.”
“Claire—”
“My sister is missing. Rafe wants a memory card you have. If you turn this into a scene about rescuing me, I will hang up.”
Another pause.
Then, quietly, “Tell me what you need.”
That almost broke me more than the apology he had not yet earned.
“I need the card. I need to know what is on it. And I need you to understand something before we go one step further.”
“Anything.”
“I am not coming back because men are chasing me.”
“I know.”
“No, Nico. Listen. I left because of you.”
The line went so quiet I could hear his breathing.
I continued. “You may have said those words to fool somebody. You may have reasons stacked on reasons. But I heard them with the ears of a woman who washed your blood out of cotton and thought that made us something.”
His voice came lower. “It did.”
“You do not get to decide that after I leave.”
“I know.”
“You do not get to buy me back.”
“I know.”
“And you do not get to call my name as if it belongs in your mouth until you have earned the right to speak to me like a person.”
This time, when he answered, there was no power in it at all.
“Then tell me how to earn it.”
A knock came at the door.
Not the soft three taps from before.
This one was loud.
Official.
A man’s voice called through the wood.
“Hotel security. Open the door.”
May you like
Lucia looked at me and mouthed one word.
Run.
