The Substitute

Chapter Three: The Apartment

By the end of her second week, Mara had learned the rhythm of Elise's job well enough to stop checking the manual Priya had written her, and well enough to notice the small strangenesses that came with wearing someone else's professional life like borrowed clothes.

Emails that referenced inside jokes she didn't understand. A contact in Elise's phone log labeled simply DON'T, called four times in the week before she vanished, never answered. A locked drawer in the desk that Priya said nobody had a key for, that facilities had been "meaning to deal with" for over a month.

And Julian, who found reasons to stop by her desk that grew thinner and more transparent each time — a document that could've been emailed, a question that could've waited.

"I have to ask you something, and it's going to sound insane," he said on a Thursday, closing her office door partway, voice low. "Elise had a storage unit. Off Fifth. She never told me what was in it, just that it was 'in case.' In case of what, I don't know. I've been meaning to check it, but I—" He stopped. Rubbed a hand over his jaw. "I haven't been able to make myself go alone."

"You want me to go with you."

"I know how it sounds. Believe me."

She should have said no. Every rational part of her — the part that paid attention to unknown numbers texting her a dead woman's name, the part that noticed how carefully everyone in this office avoided the subject of Elise Vance — knew she should say no.

"Okay," she said instead.

The storage unit was small, climate-controlled, paid up through the end of the year — someone was still covering the bill, though Julian swore it wasn't him. Inside: boxes of files, a laptop with a password neither of them could guess, and an envelope with Mara's — no. Not Mara's. Elise's — handwriting on the front.

If you're reading this, something happened to me. Ask Whitmore what he knows about the Halden numbers. Don't trust the security logs. And don't tell J. Not yet. Not until you're sure.

Julian went very still, reading over her shoulder.

"Don't tell J," he repeated, quiet. "She meant me."

"Julian—"

"I need to know what she was scared of." He looked at Mara, something raw and unguarded moving across his face for just a second before he shuttered it again. "And I think you're the only person who can help me find it, because you're already inside her life, whether either of us wanted that or not."

Outside, in the parking lot, her phone buzzed once more.

Careful who you trust with that letter, Elise.

You're not supposed to have found it yet.