Chapter 3 - Hammer didn't move.Ellie stood barefoot in the courthouse hallway.
Her guardian was nowhere behind her.
“Where's your aunt?”
Ellie didn't answer.
Hammer crouched.
“Ellie, what did you mean?”
She looked at the red writing on the mirror.
“You saw her.”
“Who?”
“Her.”
Hammer's voice dropped.
“Clara?”
Ellie nodded.
His stomach tightened.
“How do you know that name?”
Ellie looked around.
“Not here.”
Hammer straightened.
A security guard rounded the corner.
“Mr. Dawson?”
Ellie immediately grabbed Hammer's hand.
“Please.”
Hammer looked down at her fingers.
They were ice cold.
“Take me somewhere nobody can hear us.”
The guard approached.
“Sir, you're not allowed to leave.”
Hammer's lawyer appeared behind him.
“Actually, he is.”
Mara walked between them.
“He's my client.”
The guard hesitated.
Hammer looked at Ellie.
Mara noticed the child.
Her eyes narrowed.
“What is she doing here?”
Hammer answered:
“She knows Clara.”
Mara went pale.
“What did you just say?”
Ellie looked directly at Mara.
“Your sister.”
Mara stopped breathing.
Hammer stared at her.
“Your sister was Clara?”
Mara's face drained of color.
“Who told you that?”
Ellie frowned.
“She did.”
Mara stepped closer.
“When?”
Ellie pointed at Hammer.
“Before he found me.”
Hammer felt the world tilt.
“Ellie, tell me exactly what you remember.”
Ellie looked at him.
“A room.”
“What room?”
“White walls.”
“Where?”
“A hospital.”
Hammer's eyes hardened.
“Saint Mercy?”
Ellie nodded.
Mara looked terrified.
“Ray, we need to get her out of this building.”
They moved quickly.
In the underground parking garage, Hammer opened the rear door of his SUV.
Ellie climbed inside.
Mara sat beside her.
Hammer took the driver's seat.
Nobody spoke for almost a minute.
Then Ellie said:
“They wanted me to forget your face.”
Hammer looked at her through the mirror.
“Why?”
“Because I saw what happened.”
“What happened?”
Ellie swallowed.
“They took the wrong girl.”
Hammer slammed on the brakes.
Mara grabbed the dashboard.
“What?”
Ellie stared at the windshield.
“I wasn't supposed to be Ellie.”
Hammer turned around.
“Who were you supposed to be?”
Ellie whispered a name.
“Lucy.”
Hammer's face went white.
Mara closed her eyes.
“Lucy Bell?”
Ellie nodded.
Hammer stared at her.
Clara's daughter.
The daughter Hammer had believed died with her mother.
Impossible.
He had seen Clara pregnant.
He had known she was carrying a baby.
The hospital records said the child was stillborn.
Hammer had attended the funeral.
A tiny empty coffin.
He had stood there holding red flowers.
Lucy had never existed.
Or so the world believed.
Mara whispered:
“Ray, this can't be true.”
Ellie looked at her.
“Your sister told me to find him.”
Hammer's voice cracked.
“When?”
“Before she went away.”
“Where is she?”
Ellie pointed behind them.
Hammer looked.
“Where?”
“At the hospital.”
“Clara is dead.”
“No.”
Ellie shook her head.
“She wasn't dead when they buried her.”
The SUV went silent.
Hammer stared at Ellie.
“Who told you this?”
Ellie hesitated.
Then she reached inside her sweater.
Pulled out a folded piece of paper.
Hammer took it.
The paper was old.
Yellowed.
On it was a photograph.
A baby.
A woman holding the baby.
Clara.
And standing beside them was Hammer.
But the date printed below the photograph was nine years after Hammer believed Clara died.
Hammer's hands trembled.
“That photograph is impossible.”
Ellie nodded.
“They wanted you to think it was.”
Mara looked at the photograph.
Then at Hammer.
“Where did you get this?”
“From my mother.”
“Your mother?”
Ellie nodded.
“She told me never to show it until Hammer wore the red heart.”
Hammer stared.
“The heart.”
Ellie nodded.
“I put it in your vest.”
“But I lost it.”
“No.”
Hammer frowned.
Ellie smiled for the first time.
“They wanted you to think you lost it.”
Hammer turned in his seat.
“Who?”
Ellie looked toward the parking garage entrance.
A black sedan had just rolled in.
Its headlights switched off.
Ellie's voice became a whisper.
“The people watching us.”
Three men stepped out.
All wearing dark coats.
One carried a handgun.
Hammer started the engine.
Mara looked back.
“They found us.”
Hammer hit the accelerator.
The SUV exploded forward.
Gunfire cracked through the garage.
Glass shattered.
Ellie screamed.
Hammer swerved between concrete pillars.
Another shot.
A rear tire burst.
The SUV spun.
Hammer fought the steering wheel.
The black sedan followed.
Then something strange happened.
Ellie stopped crying.
She stared calmly at the approaching headlights.
“They won't shoot you.”
Hammer shouted:
“Why not?”
“Because they still need you alive.”
“For what?”
Ellie turned to him.
“To open the door.”
Hammer's eyes narrowed.
“What door?”
Ellie smiled faintly.
“The one Clara died trying to open.”
The SUV crashed through the garage exit.
And behind them, the black sedan stopped.
One of the men stepped out.
He called someone.
“She's with him.”
A pause.
May you like
Then he smiled.
“Good.”
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