The blood is gone. Or at least it looks like it is.
My hands are clean. My sleeves have been changed. The cut on my arm is wrapped tight and hidden beneath fresh fabric. The mirror tells me I am composed again—measured, controlled, intact.
It lies.
When I step into the lobby, I expect to see him. Elias always waits near the front desk when he’s angry. He pretends he isn’t waiting to see my reaction when I get near him.
But he isn’t there.
Mara stands near the reception counter, coat folded over one arm, phone in her hand. She looks up the second she hears my footsteps.
Relief crosses her face.
“I’ve been waiting for him to come upstairs for twenty minutes,” she says. “Is he still with you?”
The words don’t land properly at first.
“I sent him to go home without me. With you,” I reply.
The silence that follows is immediate and wrong.
Mara blinks. “No. I haven’t seen him.”
My chest tightens.
“That’s not possible,” I say.
“He never came through here,” she insists.
I turn slowly toward the receptionist behind the desk. “Did you see Elias leave?”
The young woman straightens instantly. “Yes, sir. He stepped out.”
“Out where?”
“For a smoke, I assumed,” she replies. “About twenty minutes ago.”
The air in my lungs goes thin. I don’t say anything else, I just rush outside.
The front doors swing open and cold air slams into me. Snow is falling, thick flakes drifting sideways under a rising wind. The street outside glows faintly under lamplight, already dusted in white.
I scan the streets.
No one.
No figure pacing near the curb. No silhouette beneath the awning.
“Elias?” I call once, low but sharp.
The storm answers.
I step fully onto the sidewalk, boots crunching into fresh snow. I walk to the corner, checking both directions. The visibility is already worsening. Wind whips through the street and lifts powder into small spirals.
Nothing.
I turn back toward the building, heart beginning to pound with a rhythm I do not like.
Inside, Mara is already watching my face.
