Chapter 3: The Child in the Green Scarf
Vasko caught the manager’s wrist.
“Give that back, Adrian.”
Zeke’s mother stared at the manager’s name tag.
It read ADRIAN COLE.
“Why does the photograph say Adrian Vasko?” she asked.
Adrian released the picture as if it had burned him.
“Because the old man is confused.
Claire, take your son and leave.”
“You know my name?”
“It’s on your employment file.”
“No.” Claire stepped between Adrian and the piano.
“You called me Claire before you looked at my badge.”
Vasko placed the photograph in her hand.
“The little boy beside Elias is Adrian,” he said.
“My younger son.”
“Your son?” Claire looked from one man to the other.
“Then Elias was—”
“My firstborn.”
Zeke tugged her sleeve.
“Mom, does that make him Grandpa?”
The word struck Vasko harder than any accusation.
He lowered himself onto the piano bench, but Adrian gave a short laugh.
“Don’t encourage this.
Elias disappeared from our family years ago.”
“He didn’t disappear,” Claire said.
“He came home to me every night until he couldn’t anymore.”
“And he never mentioned us.
That should tell you something.”
“It tells me he was hurt.”
Adrian pulled a radio from his belt.
“Security to the lobby.”
Vasko rose.
“Cancel that.”
“You don’t control this hotel.”
“No, but Margaret Hales does, and she invited me here to perform tomorrow night.
Shall we telephone her?”
Adrian’s smile tightened.
“By all means.
Tell her your grandson vandalized a piano worth more than Claire earns in ten years.”
“Don’t speak about my son that way,” Claire said.
“Your son?” Adrian pointed at the white drawing.
“Then pay for what he did.”
A woman in a gray housekeeping uniform stepped out from behind the reception desk.
Her name tag read MRS.
BELL.
“Take it from my wages,” Claire said.
“No,” Mrs.
Bell replied.
“Take it from mine.”
Adrian turned on her.
“This doesn’t concern you.”
“I have supervised Claire for four years.
It concerns me when you dismiss her in front of her child without paperwork or a hearing.”
“You’re dismissed too.”
Mrs.
Bell removed her master key card and laid it on the piano.
“Then say it again when Mrs.
Hales arrives.”
Adrian’s hand remained suspended over the radio.
Vasko looked at Zeke’s bracelet.
“May I see it?”
Zeke held out his wrist.
Vasko turned the tiny silver music note over.
A narrow line ran through its middle.
“That isn’t only a charm,” Vasko said.
“It is a key.”
“A key to what?” Claire asked.
Adrian reached for Zeke’s wrist.
Claire pulled her son behind her.
“Don’t touch him.”
“I was trying to help.”
“No,” Vasko said.
“You were trying to take it.”
Adrian stepped closer to his father.
“You have no idea what Elias became after you cast him out.”
Vasko’s jaw tightened.
“I know what you told me he became.”
“And you believed me.”
That landed between them.
Vasko looked down at the photograph, then at the piano bench.
“What did Elias leave inside this piano?” Claire asked.
“Nothing,” Adrian said quickly.
Mrs.
Bell picked up her key card again.
“The old service records say that bench was repaired twenty-seven years ago.
A second compartment was installed beneath the seat.”
Adrian’s face lost its color.
Vasko lifted the cushion.
The ordinary storage space was empty, but Zeke leaned underneath and touched a tiny silver opening shaped like a music note.
“My bracelet fits there,” he whispered.
Before Claire could stop him, Zeke unclasped the chain and pushed the silver note into the hidden lock.
Something clicked beneath the bench.
Adrian lunged forward.
Mrs.
Bell blocked him with the cleaning cart, and the false wooden bottom rose half an inch.
May you like
Inside lay a sealed envelope bearing three words in Elias’s handwriting:
FOR MY FATHER.
