CHAPTER 3: THE NIGHT EVERYTHING WAS TAKEN
“There was no festival accident,” Claire said. “It was planned.”
Thomas stood frozen as she spoke.
“They watched you for months,” she continued. “Your schedule. Your routes. Your daughter’s routines.”
The room seemed to shrink with every word.
“At the festival, someone called her name. She trusted them. That’s all it took.”
Thomas’s fists clenched.
“No…” he whispered. “I would’ve known. I would’ve—”
“You were never supposed to find her,” Claire interrupted softly.
Silence.
Eli stepped closer to Thomas, slowly placing the necklace in his hand.
Thomas looked down at it like it was burning him.
Claire’s voice trembled now.
“I managed to take her out. Just one child. Just Sofía.”
Thomas’s heart stopped.
“But I couldn’t get away clean,” she said. “They came after us. I had to disappear. I had to change everything.”
She looked at Eli and Maya.
“I met Eli first. Then Maya. I couldn’t leave them behind. I couldn’t let them be taken back.”
Thomas’s voice broke completely.
“Where is Sofía?”
Claire hesitated.
For the first time… she looked afraid.
“She’s alive,” she said.
Thomas exhaled sharply.
“But she’s not safe,” Claire added.
A long silence filled the room.
Then Thomas spoke, voice steadying into something colder.
“Take me to her.”
Claire shook her head immediately.
“If you come with us, they’ll know. They’re still watching.”
Thomas stepped forward.
“I lost her once,” he said quietly. “I am not losing her again.”
Eli looked up at him.
For the first time, there was hope in his eyes.
Maya slowly took Thomas’s hand.
Outside, in the distance… a car engine started and didn’t stop.
Claire looked toward the window, her face pale.
“They found us,” she whispered.
Thomas tightened his grip on the pendant.
“Then we stop running,” he said.
And for the first time in five years… the billionaire didn’t feel powerless.
He felt awake.
ENDING NOTE
That night, Thomas Michels didn’t just uncover a secret.
May you like
He uncovered a war.
And somewhere in the city he once owned… his daughter was still waiting to be found.
