Chapter 2 - Shadows in the Rearview MirrorPanic, cold and visceral, surged through my veins. I didn't stop to think, didn't stop to rationalize whether the phone call was a sick prank or a genuine death threat. The mention of my father’s garage—a detail known only to police investigators and survivors—hit with the undeniable force of truth.
Within ten minutes, I had thrown a few changes of clothes, my identification documents, and Carl’s letter into a battered canvas duffel bag. I killed the lights in my apartment, slipped out through the back service stairs, and hurried toward my ten-year-old sedan parked in the gravel lot behind the building.
As I pulled out onto the main road, the afternoon traffic blurred past in a smear of red taillights and gray asphalt.
I checked my rearview mirror.
A sleek, matte-black SUV had pulled out from the side alley just three car lengths behind me. It matched my speed, turned when I turned, and kept an unyielding, predatory distance.
My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. Carl was dead. The man who had married me in his final hours, the man who claimed to have watched over me my entire life, had left me not a peaceful bereavement, but a target painted squarely on my back.
Where was I supposed to go? My friends were ordinary people with ordinary lives; dragging them into whatever deadly conspiracy Carl had emerged from was out of the question.
Then I remembered a detail from Jonathan Vance’s brief introduction on my porch. Jonathan had handed me a business card before vanishing. In the panic of dropping the letter, I had shoved the card into my coat pocket.
I pulled over to the side of the highway, my hands shaking so badly I nearly dropped the steering wheel. Rummaging through my pockets, I fished out the heavy card stock. Embossed in silver lettering was an address in the financial district: Vance & Sterling Legal Associates, Suite 1400.
And written in pen on the back of the card was a handwritten note: If the shadow follows you, come to the penthouse.
I slammed my foot down on the gas pedal, merging back into the highway traffic. The matte-black SUV surged forward too, closing the gap with terrifying speed. I took a reckless, sharp exit toward downtown, tires squealing as I navigated the concrete labyrinth of the city, desperate to reach Suite 1400 before my pursuers caught up.
When I finally screeched to a halt outside the towering glass-and-steel skyscraper, I didn't bother locking my car. I sprinted through the revolving brass doors, past a startled security guard, and threw myself into the elevator, hammering the button for the fourteenth floor with frantic desperation.
The elevator doors chimed open to reveal a sleek, minimalist reception area bathed in cool white light.
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Jonathan Vance sat behind a massive mahogany desk, looking up as I stumbled out of the elevator, breathless, disheveled, and terrified.
“Ah, Mrs. Vance,” Jonathan said calmly, adjusting his gold-rimmed spectacles. “I see you made excellent time. And I take it you noticed our friends in the black SUV?”
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