Chapter 4 - The Archive on St. Jude’s
The words did not make sense. They fractured against the walls of Adam’s brain like broken glass.
The crash seven years ago?
Adam stared at the paper until his eyes burned. Seven years ago, Clara had suffered a difficult birth at county hospital during a winter blizzard. Adam had been involved in an accident on the icy freeway while rushing to her side—a hit-and-run that left him in a coma for two weeks. When he woke up, Clara had been sitting beside his hospital bed, cradling an infant with wide, solemn hazel eyes. She had placed the child in his arms and said, “Meet your son, Adam. He waited for you.”
He looked into the rearview mirror. Lucas was curled on his side, clutching a small stuffed wolf Clara had bought him. His features were undeniable: the straight brow, the slight cleft in the chin. Everyone in town remarked that the boy was Adam Vance’s mirror image. How could Clara write such madness? Was it the cancer? Was it the morphine-induced paranoia of her final months?
Locker 44.
Adam turned the SUV around without waking the boy. He drove through the sleet-slicked streets toward downtown, eventually pulling into the driveway of his sister Sarah's house.
""Take him for tonight, Sarah,"" Adam said through the rain on her porch, handing over the sleeping boy wrapped in a wool blanket. ""I have to deal with the probate documents at the firm. I can't be in that house alone tonight.""
Sarah looked at him with wet, sorrowful eyes. ""Adam, you’re in shock. Stay here with us.""
""I have to work, Sarah. It’s the only thing that keeps me standing.""
Before she could protest, he turned back into the rain.
St. Jude’s Lane was an old, narrow alley running behind the Catholic hospital where Clara had died. Tucked between a closed pawnshop and a dry cleaner was an automated storage facility built into the basement of an old Victorian brownstone. The air inside smelled of dust, lime mortar, and damp iron.
Adam walked down the echoing corridor until he found unit 44. His hand shaking, he inserted the tarnished silver key.
The heavy brass lock yielded with a sharp click.
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Adam pulled the metal roll-up door upward. Inside sat a single green metal filing box, sitting atop a folding wooden stool. Beside it was a framed photograph, turned facedown.
Adam lifted the metal box and popped the latches. Inside were dozens of medical charts, DNA matching kits with broken seals, and a thick surveillance folder containing black-and-white photos of himself—taken from inside his own home over the last six years.
