Chapter Nine: Ferris Point
354 Words
She asked him on Sunday, in his apartment, in the soft after-quiet of a morning that had started with far fewer clothes and far more certainty than either of them had planned on. She watched his face exactly like the messages told her to.
His face didn't fall. It went perfectly, terribly still.
"Where did you hear that name?"
"Julian."
"Mara. Where."
"Answer the question first."
He sat up, raking a hand through his hair, and for a long moment she thought he might actually refuse. Then: "Ferris Point is a property my father owns. Owned. He died last year. Elise found out I'd been quietly managing his estate through a shell account, because the family didn't want the tabloids finding out how much debt he'd actually left behind, or where some of that debt had gone." His jaw tightened. "It's not a crime, Mara. It's embarrassing, and it's private, and I never told Elise because I didn't trust anyone with it yet — not because I was hiding a body in the basement."
"Then why would someone tell me to be afraid of it?"
"Someone." His eyes sharpened. "Someone's been talking to you. This whole time. Haven't they?"
She hadn't meant to say it yet. It came out anyway, the whole shape of it — the first text, the ones that followed, every warning delivered like clockwork just when she was most vulnerable to hearing it.
Julian went pale in a way she hadn't seen on him before, not even discussing Elise's disappearance.
"Mara. Listen to me very carefully." His hands found hers, gripping tight. "Elise had a burner phone. The police found records showing she'd been texting someone in the weeks before she vanished — someone we could never identify, using a number that traced back to nothing. We assumed it was someone helping her. Or someone threatening her." His voice dropped, urgent now. "What if it's the same person? What if they're not warning you about me?"
"Then what are they doing?"
"What if," Julian said slowly, "they're doing to you exactly what they did to her. Right before she disappeared."
- Writer
