CHAPTER 19 — DANIEL’S BROTHER
The man crossing between the trains moved with frightening confidence.
His hands caught the steel support bars as if he had done it many times before.
Claire climbed down from the roof hatch.
“Close it!” Celeste shouted.
The man’s fingers appeared over the edge.
Claire slammed the hatch.
His hand stopped it.
He forced it open.
Elias backed toward the far wall.
The man dropped into the carriage.
He wore Daniel’s face, Daniel’s coat and Daniel’s wedding ring on a chain around his neck.
But his eyes were different.
Daniel’s eyes softened whenever he looked at Claire.
This man looked at her as if she were an object in a locked display case.
“You must be Gabriel,” Claire said.
He smiled.
“So someone finally told you.”
“Where is my husband?”
Gabriel pointed through the window.
“Standing exactly where Margaret told him to stand.”
Daniel was still inside the other train with Noah.
He held the red plastic key against the glass.
“Let them come over,” Claire said.
“Only one person crosses.”
Gabriel looked at Elias.
“The blue key.”
Claire moved between them.
“You’re not touching him.”
“I have no interest in the boy.”
“You climbed onto a moving train to reach him.”
“I came for the ring.”
Claire held up her empty hand.
Gabriel’s expression changed.
“Where is it?”
“In the control panel.”
He looked toward the open compartment.
The empty ring sat in the circular slot.
“Remove it.”
“No.”
Gabriel pulled a small knife from his coat.
Celeste stepped forward.
“Gabriel, listen to me.”
His face hardened.
“You do not speak to me.”
“I helped keep you alive.”
“You helped keep me buried.”
The countdown reached four minutes.
Gabriel moved toward the control panel.
Claire blocked him.
“You know what happens if you remove the ring?”
“This train reaches the final station.”
“The other train hits the wall.”
Gabriel looked through the window at Daniel.
“That was always the plan.”
Claire understood the hatred in his voice.
“You want Daniel dead.”
“I want Margaret to feel what she made me feel.”
“She won’t. Noah will die with him.”
For the first time, Gabriel hesitated.
Elias moved closer to Claire.
Gabriel looked at him.
“How old are you?”
“Seven.”
“Do you know who I am?”
Elias shook his head.
“I’m the uncle nobody was allowed to remember.”
The trains shook as the tracks moved closer together.
Daniel opened his roof hatch.
Gabriel raised the knife.
“If he crosses, I remove the ring.”
Claire watched Daniel climb onto the roof.
Noah remained alone in the second carriage.
“Daniel!” she shouted through the glass. “Stay there!”
He could not hear her.
Gabriel stepped closer to the panel.
Claire looked at Elias’s blue key.
Then at Noah’s red key.
Charles had designed the system to require both boys.
Not one.
Both.
She pulled the storage chip from her pocket and inserted it into the side of the control panel.
The screen changed.
A recorded image of Charles Vale appeared.
His face was thin and exhausted.
“If you are watching this,” he said, “Margaret has brought both children to the terminal.”
Gabriel went still.
Charles continued.
“Do not trust the man wearing Daniel’s face.”
Gabriel stared at the screen.
May you like
Then Charles spoke one final sentence.
“Gabriel, your mother lied to you about the night you disappeared.”
