Chapter 3
Elena fumbled through the pockets of her beige blouse with trembling fingers until her thumb located her smartphone. The screen was cracked across the top corner—a casualty of the day she discovered her ex-husband's embezzlement of their joint savings. With a shaking hand, she tapped on Julian's contact card and hit the call button, holding the device up to her ear as the steady, agonizing sound of ringing filled the tense air of the Maplewood office.
Around them, the remaining tenants in the waiting area looked away, uncomfortable with the domestic warfare playing out in the open. Leo shifted his weight from one foot to the other, the tie-dye shirt he wore feeling suffocatingly hot under the blazing lobby lights.
"Come on, Julian, answer the phone," Elena muttered under her breath, pacing a small circle near the reception desk.
The ringing continued for a full thirty seconds before the line clicked over to voicemail. A pre-recorded message stated that the subscriber was currently unavailable and asked to leave a tone. Panic, cold and sharp, began to pool in the pit of Elena's stomach. Julian never missed her calls, not when she was going through a crisis.
Clara let out a sharp, condescending laugh, pausing near the exit with her hand resting on the push-bar of the door.
"Going straight to voicemail? How convenient," Clara taunted, shaking her head. "Or maybe he just doesn't want to deal with his dramatic sister begging for handouts anymore. Face facts, Elena. You're out."
Arthur the clerk busied himself by organizing a stack of unrelated property forms, clearly wishing he could dissolve into the drywall to escape the family drama.
Elena refused to let Clara have the final word. She redialed the number immediately, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. This time, instead of ringing through to Julian's personal cell, a strange text notification popped up on her screen from an unrecognized local number.
The screen illuminated her face in the dimming afternoon light as she read the incoming message out loud without thinking.
May you like
"‘Stop calling him,’" Elena read, her voice dropping an octave as she stared at the words. "‘He can't talk right now.’"
Clara’s triumphant smirk vanished instantly, replaced by a sudden, unmistakable look of stark terror that she tried desperately to mask behind a wall of anger.
