Chapter 5: Fire in the Oven**
Three weeks into their new life, tragedy struck at four o’clock in the morning.
Clara was kneading sourdough bread in the back kitchen when a deafening crash shattered the front storefront. Within seconds, thick black smoke rolled through the kitchen vents. A deliberate fire had been set in the alleyway beside the flour storage, fed by industrial accelerants.
“Marta! Toby!” Clara screamed, dropping the dough and lunging toward the basement stairs.
The air was already turning toxic, dense with suffocating soot. Downstairs, Toby was coughing violently, frozen in panic near his bed. Clara wrapped him in a wet wool blanket, hoisting him onto her back, and charged up the narrow stairs toward the rear exit.
The alley door was jammed from the outside with an iron bar. Trapped between rising flames and locked metal, adrenaline surged through Clara’s veins. Grabbing a heavy steel fire extinguisher from the wall, she smashed the iron latch repeatedly with raw, furious strength until the bolts gave way.
They spilled out into the cold morning air just as the fire engine sirens wailed in the distance.
Marta was already outside, weeping as she watched thirty years of her life go up in smoke. Clara collapsed on the curb, hugging Toby tightly against her chest, her hands blackened with ash, her lungs burning.
Among the crowd of onlookers across the street, Clara caught the unmistakable silhouette of a man in a dark charcoal trench coat, snapping a photo with a telephoto lens before disappearing into an idling black sedan.
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It wasn't an accident. It was a message.
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