Over the next two weeks, Julian brought the girls back every other night. They asked for Clara.
They didn’t speak much, but the silence changed. It became companionable. Clara brought them crayons and paper. They didn’t draw stick figures; they drew intricate, swirling patterns—vortexes of color.
One Tuesday, while Julian took a call outside, Clara sat with them.
“My sister used to love the color yellow,” Clara mused, coloring a sun in the corner of June’s paper. “She said it tasted like lemons.”
June looked up, her dark eyes intense. She picked up a yellow crayon, pressed it into Clara’s palm, and closed Clara’s fingers around it.
“Mama sang yellow,” June said clearly.
Clara’s heart hammered. She nodded slowly. “Did she?”
“Cello,” Iris added, pointing to the swirling patterns. “She played the cello.”
“Broken,” Rose whispered, drawing a jagged black line through the colors.
When Julian returned and heard them recounting the colors of their mother’s music, he broke down. He left a five-hundred-dollar tip, which Clara tried to refuse, but he pressed it into her hand, his grip shaking.
“You are giving me my life back,” he choked out.
Lydia saw the exchange from the car waiting outside. The next day, the manager of The Velvet Oak, a man named Gavin, called Clara into his office.
Gavin was a man who sweated grease and ambition. He had recently bought a new sports car despite the restaurant’s declining profits.
“We have a problem, Clara,” Gavin said, sliding an envelope across the desk. “Mrs. Lydia Sterling called. She claims you’re manipulating the children. Confusing them. She says you’re practicing unlicensed therapy on minors.”
“I’m coloring with them, Gavin,” Clara said, her voice trembling with indignation.
“She also mentioned a missing diamond brooch,” Gavin said, his eyes avoiding hers. “From the girls’ coats.”
Clara felt the blood drain from her face. “That’s a lie.”
“Is it?” Gavin stood up. “I need to check your locker.”
The setup was clumsy, but effective. Tucked inside the pocket of Clara’s spare cardigan in her locker was a diamond brooch shaped like a musical note.
Clara was fired on the spot. Gavin threatened to call the police if she didn’t leave immediately and sign a non-disclosure agreement promising never to contact the Sterlings again.
Terrified and heartbroken, Clara signed.
The Descent
For a week, Clara lay in her small apartment, staring at the ceiling. She felt like she had abandoned those girls to the darkness.
Meanwhile, at the Sterling estate, the regression was instant. The girls stopped eating. They locked themselves in the nursery. Lydia told Julian that Clara had been a thief, a con artist who had drugged the girls with sweets to make them compliant.
“She was using you, Julian,” Lydia hissed over dinner. “She wanted a payout. The girls are traumatized because she manipulated them.”
Julian wanted to believe in Clara, but the brooch—the one he had given Elena—was damning evidence.
But the girls were not done.
Trapped in their room, Iris, June, and Rose began to draw. They didn’t draw swirls anymore. They drew a story.
They drew a picture of a man with a “G” on his nametag putting something shiny in a blue sweater. They drew a woman with red hair (Lydia) handing the man a thick envelope of green paper.
And they drew a map. A map of the “Cold Room.”
The Gala
Ten days later, the Sterling Foundation Gala was held at the historic Blackstone Hotel. It was the night Lydia planned to announce her petition for full guardianship, citing Julian’s “lapse in judgment” regarding the children’s safety.
Julian stood at the podium, looking like a ghost. The girls were seated at the front table, dressed in stiff lace, looking more like dolls than children.
Clara was at home, packing her bags to leave Chicago, when a knock came at her door.
It was Henry, the old dishwasher from The Velvet Oak. He was out of breath, holding a smartphone with a cracked screen.
“You need to see this,” he wheezed.
He played a video. It was grainy footage from the alley behind the restaurant. It showed Gavin and Lydia arguing.
“I planted it like you said,” Gavin’s voice was tinny but audible. “But the dad is asking questions. I need more money if I’m going to lie to the cops.”
“You’ll get your money when I get the girls,” Lydia spat back.
Clara grabbed her coat. “Henry, drive.”
The Crescendo
The ballroom was silent as Lydia took the microphone from a defeated Julian.
“My brother-in-law has suffered enough,” Lydia crooned, her voice dripping with faux sympathy. “It is time for the children to have stability. Away from predators who take advantage of our grief.”
The double doors at the back of the ballroom slammed open.
Security stepped forward, but Clara Vance marched through them, holding Henry’s phone high. She wasn’t wearing a gown; she was in jeans and her old trench coat, wet with rain.
” The only predator in this room,” Clara’s voice rang out, shaking but loud, “is standing at the microphone.”
The crowd gasped. Lydia turned pale. “Get her out of here! She’s the thief!”
Julian looked up, confusion warring with hope.
“Daddy!”
See more on the next page
Advertisement
