Chapter 3 - The Vanishing Bride
We took the service stairs down to the lower basement level, bypassing the main elevators and the lobby entirely.
The air in the concrete stairwell was cold, smelling of laundry detergent and damp engine exhaust. My footsteps echoed sharply against the steel risers, each step taking me further away from the ballroom, further away from the life I had almost allowed Derek Sterling to build around my neck like a noose.
At the bottom of the stairs, we pushed through the heavy fire door into the dimly lit underground loading dock.
A black SUV stood waiting near the industrial linen carts, its engine idling quietly, exhaust fumes curling up toward the concrete ceiling.
The driver’s door opened, and a tall, broad-shouldered man in a dark coat stepped out. It was Frank, a retired state trooper whom my late uncle had hired years ago to run security for our family estate.
"Claire," Frank said, opening the rear door. "Everything is set. Your new residence in Evanston is secured. No one knows the address except Marcus and myself."
"Thank you, Frank," I said, sliding into the back seat.
Lena climbed in beside me, clutching her purse, while Marcus took the front passenger seat, his laptop already open on his knees as his fingers flew across the keyboard.
"I am executing the emergency service of process now," Marcus announced as the SUV pulled out of the loading dock into the rainy Chicago night. "The Sheriff's department will serve the emergency temporary restraining order and the civil summons directly to Derek Sterling at the hotel within twenty minutes."
I leaned my head against the cool windowpane, watching the blurred neon lights of Michigan Avenue reflect off the wet asphalt.
My phone, sitting in my jacket pocket, suddenly began to vibrate violently.
I pulled it out.
The screen illuminated with Derek’s face.
DEREK CALLING.
I didn't answer.
Three seconds later, the call dropped, and another immediately took its place.
DEREK CALLING.
Then a text message flashed across the screen:
DEREK: Where the hell are you? Your father is standing here waiting for the dance. Get your ass back down here right now or I swear to God I will call the bank and pull the loan on your dad’s South Loop project.
Five seconds later, another message:
DEREK: You think you can embarrass me in front of my family? Answer your phone, Claire. You are my wife now. You don't get to run away.
I looked at the word wife.
He genuinely believed that signing a marriage certificate gave him ownership over my life, my choices, and my father's company. He believed that my fear would keep me silent, as it had for eighteen months.
I tapped the screen, opened our chat thread, and selected the audio file Marcus had just extracted from my dress.
I hit Send.
Then I attached the high-resolution photograph of my bruised, bloody face taken under the bright lights of the bridal suite.
I hit Send.
I watched the two small blue checks appear beside the messages.
Read at 9:14 PM.
For two full minutes, the phone went completely silent. No calls. No texts.
Then, my screen lit up with a text from my father, Arthur:
FATHER: Claire, what did you do?! Derek just walked out of the ballroom white as a sheet! His mother is screaming! What is going on?!
I didn't reply to my father either. My father had known about Derek's temper. He had seen the small bruises on my arms three months ago and had chosen to look away because Derek’s family held the refinancing terms for his fifty-million-dollar real estate development. He had traded his daughter's safety for a commercial loan.
I took the SIM card out of my phone, snapped it in half between my thumb and forefinger, and tossed the pieces into the small trash bin built into the door panel.
May you like
"He knows now," I said quietly into the dark interior of the SUV.
"He's about to know a lot more," Marcus replied from the front seat, clicking his mouse with a definitive snap. "The Cook County Sheriff’s deputies have just entered the Grand Regency lobby."
