Chapter 1 - BEHIND THE WALL
The wall moved before I saw Rhea.
A deep wooden thud rolled through the upstairs corridor just as I stepped inside with my travel bag.
Then I heard crying.
Not loud.
Muffled.
Behind the wall.
I froze.
“Perrin?”
The crying stopped.
My four-year-old son answered so faintly I almost convinced myself I had imagined it.
“Dad?”
My bag hit the floor.
I ran.
The sound came from the paneled wall beside the upstairs sitting room, a section of the house I had walked past thousands of times without knowing there was anything behind it.
“Perrin!”
“Daddy!”
I hit the panel with both hands.
It did not move.
I found a narrow seam.
Pulled.
Nothing.
Then I saw a brass edge beneath the molding.
A concealed latch.
I tore at it.
Wood cracked.
The panel jumped out of its track and crashed onto the hallway floor.
A black opening appeared.
My son was curled inside.
His T-shirt was gray with dust.
His shorts were ripped and filthy.
Both knees were red from where he had landed.
An empty water bottle lay beside him.
His stuffed dog was several feet away.
For one second Perrin simply stared at me.
Then his face collapsed.
“Dad… is it really you?”
I dropped to my knees.
“It’s me.”
He crawled into my arms so fast his forehead struck my chest.
I lifted him.
His hands locked behind my neck.
He smelled like dust, sweat, and fear.
“How long have you been in there?”
He shook his head.
“Don’t know.”
“Are you hurt?”
“My knees.”
“Anything else?”
He buried his face against me.
That was when I saw Rhea.
She stood ten feet away.
Elegant party dress.
Diamond earrings.
Engagement ring.
The downstairs engagement dinner was still going on.
Guests were laughing somewhere below.
Music played.
My fiancée stared at the broken panel.
Not Perrin.
The panel.
“What did you do?”
“Kiernan—”
“What did you do to my son?”
“He was having a tantrum.”
Perrin flinched.
I felt it.
Rhea saw me notice.
“He needed somewhere quiet.”
“You locked him inside a wall?”
“It isn’t a wall. It’s an old service room.”
I stepped toward her.
Perrin tightened around me.
Rhea raised both hands.
“Kiernan, think.”
I saw something near her heel.
Perrin’s stuffed dog.
I bent, picked it up, and handed it to him.
He crushed it against my shoulder.
Then pointed at Rhea.
“She threw me.”
Rhea snapped:
“He fell.”
Perrin began crying harder.
“No! She said disappear!”
My vision narrowed.
“What did you say to him?”
Rhea looked toward the staircase.
Guests.
Witnesses.
Image.
Always image.
“I said he needed to stop disappearing from his room.”
Perrin shook his head violently.
“She said you never find me.”
That broke whatever restraint I had left.
I moved between Rhea and the child.
She reached toward Perrin.
“Let me talk to him.”
I shoved her backward.
Once.
Hard.
Rhea stumbled into the large dessert table positioned beside the sitting-room entrance.
Her back struck it.
The legs folded.
Cake collapsed across her dress.
Crystal glasses fell and shattered.
Rhea hit the floor.
The music downstairs stopped.
I immediately knew I had crossed a line.
Perrin was already safe in my arms.
I could have stepped away.
Instead I had used force out of rage.
I would tell police exactly that later.
Rhea looked up at me, icing across her shoulder.
“Touch me again, and I’ll destroy you.”
“Stay away from my son.”
Footsteps thundered upstairs.
Guests appeared.
Someone screamed.
Someone lifted a phone.
I did not care.
Perrin grabbed my arm.
“Dad.”
“I’m here.”
“Dad…”
Something in his voice changed.
Not only fear.
Urgency.
I looked at him.
Perrin stared at Rhea.
Then whispered:
“Mom never died.”
Everything stopped.
Rhea’s face emptied.
My wife, Serena, had been dead for three years.
A mountain-road crash.
Vehicle found below a ravine.
Fire.
Identification.
Death certificate.
Funeral.
Three years of waking beside an empty pillow.
Three years of telling Perrin his mother loved him even though he barely remembered her.
I could not breathe.
“What did you say?”
Perrin pressed his cheek against mine.
“Mom never died.”
Rhea stood.
“Kiernan, he’s frightened. He doesn’t understand—”
Perrin pointed at her.
“She hid her.”
I looked at Rhea.
May you like
She stopped talking.
And that silence frightened me more than anything she could have said.
