Chapter 3 - The Woman Who Disappeared Before Me
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Paige stared at the photograph in Gabriel's hand.
His sister looked nothing like him.
Where Gabriel's expression was usually guarded, hers was open.
Where his eyes seemed permanently darkened by suspicion, hers held a brightness Paige had almost forgotten people could possess.
“What was her name?” Paige asked.
“Lucia.”
Gabriel lowered himself into the chair across from the bed.
“She was twenty-six when she disappeared.”
Paige studied the picture.
“What did Richard do to her?”
Gabriel's jaw tightened.
“That's what I'm trying to prove.”
For a moment, the room was quiet except for the sound of wind against the windows.
Then Paige asked, “Was she involved with Colin?”
“No. She worked as a financial compliance analyst for a private investment firm.”
Paige frowned.
“And Richard was a client?”
Gabriel nodded.
“His companies were.”
He explained that Lucia had discovered unusual transfers involving several Hale-owned corporations.
Money moved through consulting agreements, charitable foundations, and foreign holding companies.
Most of the transactions looked legitimate until someone examined the businesses receiving the payments.
Some had no employees.
No offices.
No actual services.
Just addresses and bank accounts.
Lucia had started asking questions.
Then she disappeared.
“Did she tell you what she'd found?” Paige asked.
“Not enough.”
“Why?”
Gabriel looked away.
“We weren't speaking much at the time.”
The answer surprised her.
“Why not?”
He gave a humorless smile.
“Lucia hated what I did for a living.”
Paige stared at him.
“She wanted you out?”
“She wanted me to become someone she could introduce to her friends without lying.”
Gabriel looked down at his hands.
“I kept telling her I was protecting the family.”
“And she didn't believe you?”
“She said protecting people wasn't the same as controlling them.”
The words settled between them.
Paige thought about the locked cathedral doors.
The armed guards.
The debt documents.
Gabriel seemed to understand what she was thinking.
“Lucia would have hated what I did at the church.”
“Even though you stopped the wedding?”
“Especially because I used violence to do it.”
Paige looked at the photograph again.
For the first time, she saw something beneath Gabriel's controlled exterior.
Grief.
Not the polished kind people displayed at funerals.
The ugly, unfinished kind that left someone searching for answers years after everyone else had moved on.
“Why do you think she's dead?” Paige asked.
Gabriel's expression changed.
“I don't know that she is.”
Paige went still.
“You said she disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“Then she might be alive.”
He looked at her.
“I've spent three years trying not to stop believing that.”
A long silence followed.
Then Paige remembered something.
A dinner at Colin's family's penthouse eighteen months earlier.
Richard Hale had been drinking bourbon with two business partners.
Colin was beside her, one hand resting possessively on the back of her neck.
Richard mentioned a woman who had caused problems for the investment company.
Colin laughed.
Then said something Paige had never understood.
The Rossy girl should've stayed in her lane.
Her stomach tightened.
“Gabriel.”
He looked up.
“I heard Colin mention your sister.”
Gabriel went completely still.
“When?”
She explained the dinner.
The penthouse.
The bourbon.
Richard's conversation.
Then she repeated Colin's words.
Gabriel's expression turned terrifyingly calm.
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
“Did they say anything else?”
Paige tried to remember.
She closed her eyes.
Colin had been drinking.
Richard had been irritated.
There was an argument about an account somewhere overseas.
And then—
Her eyes opened.
“Richard told Colin to stop talking because the matter had been handled in Geneva.”
Gabriel leaned forward.
“Geneva?”
Paige nodded.
“I remember because Colin joked that Switzerland was where rich people buried their mistakes.”
Gabriel reached for his phone.
Then stopped.
He looked at Paige.
“Would you be willing to tell my attorney exactly what you remember?”
She hesitated.
“Would that put me in danger?”
“I won't lie to you. It could.”
The honesty frightened her.
But she appreciated it.
She looked down at her hands.
“Colin already knows I left with you.”
“Yes.”
“And he knows I heard things while we were together.”
“Probably.”
Paige took a shaky breath.
“Then I'm already in danger.”
Gabriel said nothing.
She looked at him.
“I'll speak to the attorney.”
He nodded.
“Thank you.”
But before he could stand, Paige asked one more question.
“Why did you really take my father's debt?”
Gabriel's expression hardened.
“Because I needed Colin to release you publicly.”
“You could have exposed him.”
“I tried.”
“What happened?”
“His father buried every complaint. Every medical report. Every witness.”
Paige felt sick.
Gabriel continued.
“Colin wasn't simply a violent man protected by money. He was part of a family that had spent decades making consequences disappear.”
She looked away.
Then whispered, “My father sold me to them.”
Gabriel's voice softened.
“Your father failed you.”
Paige looked up sharply.
No excuses.
No explanations.
No comforting lies about how Arthur had done his best.
Just the truth.
For a moment, tears filled her eyes.
Then she asked, “And you? Are you any different from Richard?”
Gabriel held her gaze.
“Not enough.”
It wasn't the answer she expected.
Then he stood.
“Rest. Helen will be nearby if you need anything.”
He walked toward the door.
But before leaving, he turned.
“Paige?”
“Yes?”
“If you remember anything else about Geneva, tell the attorney. Don't try to investigate it yourself.”
She nodded.
Then he added, “And don't let anyone convince you that surviving Colin makes you responsible for what happened to Lucia.”
When he left, Paige sat alone for a long time.
Then she remembered the final evening she'd spent in Colin's penthouse before escaping two years earlier.
He had been furious about a missing document.
He'd accused her of touching his office safe.
And he'd thrown a folder across the room.
One page had landed near her feet.
She remembered the heading.
L.R. — Geneva Transfer.
At the time, the letters meant nothing.
Now she knew Lucia Rossy's initials.
May you like
And suddenly, the missing woman wasn't a stranger anymore.
She was connected to a document Paige had seen with her own eyes.
