CHAPTER 3: The Phone Call From the Dead
“Sophia?”
Daniel's voice cracked.
The entire café fell away.
The rain.
The chatter.
The clinking cups.
Everything disappeared.
Only the voice on the phone remained.
“Daniel… please don't say my name so loudly.”
The woman's words came in a frightened whisper.
Daniel gripped the table to keep himself from collapsing.
His face had turned ghost white.
Across from him, Emma could read his lips.
One word.
Sophia.
Her heart nearly stopped.
“No…” she signed.
“No… no…”
Lily looked up from her coloring book.
“Daddy?”
Daniel couldn't answer.
The voice came again.
“I don't have much time.”
His eyes filled with tears.
“You're dead,” he whispered.
A painful silence.
Then the woman replied:
“I know that's what everyone believes.”
Emma covered her mouth.
The phone slipped from Daniel's trembling hand and landed on the table.
The speaker was still on.
Now Emma could hear nothing, but she could see the tiny waves on the screen, proof that someone was speaking.
Daniel quickly turned the phone toward her and typed:
It's Sophia.
Emma's hands began shaking uncontrollably.
Impossible.
Her sister.
Alive.
After eight years.
After two funerals.
After endless grief.
The voice returned.
“Is Lily with you?”
Daniel looked at his daughter.
“Yes.”
A soft sob came through the speaker.
“Is she okay?”
“She misses you every day.”
Silence.
Then the woman began crying.
Tiny, broken sounds.
Lily stared at her father.
“Daddy… why are you crying?”
Daniel couldn't answer.
Because if this was truly Sophia…
everything he believed had been a lie.
“Listen to me carefully,” the woman said.
“You're in danger.”
Daniel froze.
“What?”
“You and Lily. You're both in danger.”
Emma's stomach tightened.
“Who's doing this?” Daniel asked.
“I can't explain over the phone.”
“Where are you?”
Another long silence.
Then:
“I've been hiding.”
“For six years?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
The answer came so softly he almost missed it.
“Because they tried to kill me.”
The words hit like a lightning strike.
Emma nearly dropped the phone.
Daniel looked around the café as if danger might suddenly appear from every corner.
“Who?”
“I don't know who I can trust.”
“You can trust me!”
“I thought so once.”
Her voice broke.
“But someone close to us betrayed me.”
Daniel's blood turned cold.
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
A man walked past their table, and Sophia suddenly gasped.
“No…”
“What is it?”
“I have to go.”
“Wait!”
“Don't go home tonight.”
“What?”
“Take Lily somewhere safe.”
“Sophia!”
“If you want answers, come to the old train station tomorrow.”
“Which station?”
“You know the one.”
Daniel's eyes widened.
The abandoned station on the edge of town.
The place where he and Sophia had their first date.
“Come alone,” she whispered.
Then, after a pause:
“And bring Emma.”
Daniel's heart skipped a beat.
She knew.
She knew Emma had found him.
“How do you know she's here?” he asked.
No answer.
Only breathing.
Then:
“I've been watching.”
The line went dead.
Silence.
Complete silence.
Daniel slowly lowered the phone.
Emma was staring at him in horror.
She quickly typed on her own phone.
She knows I'm here?
He nodded.
How?
“I don't know.”
Lily looked between them.
“Daddy?”
Daniel pulled her into his arms.
His daughter wrapped her little arms around his neck.
“Why are you sad?”
He closed his eyes.
Because he didn't know what to say.
How could he tell an eight-year-old girl that her dead mother had just called?
At that exact moment, someone else in the café was watching them.
The businessman.
The same man who had complained earlier.
He had never really left.
He sat inside a black car across the street.
Rain slid down the windshield.
A Bluetooth earpiece glowed in his ear.
He watched Daniel holding Lily.
Then he spoke quietly.
“He got the call.”
A deep voice answered from the other end.
“Is the woman with him?”
The man looked through the window.
Emma.
“Yes.”
A long silence.
Then:
“So she's alive too.”
The businessman frowned.
“What do you want me to do?”
The voice became cold.
“Follow them.”
“And if they find her?”
Another pause.
Then came four words that made even the businessman uneasy.
“Make sure they don't.”
The call ended.
Inside the car, the man looked back at the café.
Then he opened his glove compartment.
Inside was a photograph.
Old.
Faded.
A family picture.
Sophia.
Emma.
Their parents.
And a younger version of himself.
The businessman touched the picture with trembling fingers.
Because his real name wasn't Richard Lawson.
And he wasn't a stranger.
He whispered to himself:
“I'm sorry, Sophia.”
Then he started the engine.
Back inside the café, Daniel was helping Lily put on her coat.
He looked at Emma.
“We should leave.”
She nodded.
Both of them had the same terrifying feeling.
Someone had been watching them long before tonight.
As they stepped outside, the rain had almost stopped.
The city lights reflected across the wet pavement.
Lily suddenly tugged at Emma's sleeve.
Emma looked down.
The little girl held out another drawing.
A new one.
Three people standing together.
And above them, written in messy crayon letters:
MY FAMILY IS COMING BACK.
Emma's eyes filled with tears.
Then something caught her attention.
At the bottom corner of the page was a tiny symbol.
A black bird inside a circle.
She froze.
Because she had seen that symbol before.
Eight years ago.
On an envelope that arrived the day before Sophia disappeared.
An envelope containing only one sentence:
SHE KNOWS TOO MUCH.
Emma's blood turned to ice.
Because if the black bird had returned…
Then Sophia had never been running from one person.
She had been hiding from an organization.
May you like
And somehow…
Lily had just drawn their symbol.
