Part 2:

I leaned over her so fast I nearly knocked the monitor loose.

“Told me what?” I whispered.

Emily tried to speak, but the effort twisted her face in pain. Alan stepped forward, adjusting the IV. “She needs rest, Richard.”

“No,” Emily rasped, her voice thin but urgent. “No more waiting.”

Her fingers clamped around my wrist with surprising strength. “Daniel… not safe.”

I tightened my grip on the bloodstained fabric. “Did he do this to you?”

Her eyes filled with fear, and for a second I thought she would say yes. Instead, she barely shook her head.
“Not… alone.”

Alan and I exchanged a glance.

“Emily,” I said carefully, “what does ‘Ask him about Denver’ mean?”

She froze.

That single word hit harder than the pain medication. Her breathing sped up. The heart monitor climbed.

Alan swore softly. “Richard, stop. You’re pushing her into tachycardia.”

But Emily was staring at me now, horrified—not because I had said it, but because I knew it.

“You saw it,” she whispered. “Oh God.”

Then she passed out.

Everything after that moved quickly. Alan ordered imaging, bloodwork, a psych consult, and police notification. I stood in the hallway with dried blood on my hands and called Daniel Miller.

He answered on the second ring, breathless. “Richard? I’ve been trying to find Emily. She left after dinner and—”

“She’s at St. Mary’s.”

Silence.

Then: “Is she okay?”

The concern in his voice sounded real. Too real. “Get here now,” I said, and hung up.

The police arrived within fifteen minutes. Detective Lena Ortiz—mid-forties, sharp-eyed, efficient—listened as I described the initials, the message, and the way Emily had begged me not to let him know she was alive.

Her reaction wasn’t what I expected.

She asked, “Has your daughter mentioned a storage unit? Or a safety-deposit key?”

I stared at her. “What?”

She pulled a photo from her folder and handed it to me.