The study was quiet.
A car passed outside now and then. The sound faded fast.
The shop closed.
Five years. She'd run that shop for five years, then closed it, then vanished from the town's records without leaving any easy trail. I braced one hand on the desk, stared at the neat row of file folders, said nothing.
"Keep looking," I said. "Any progress, tell me immediately."
"Understood."
I hung up. Sat down in the chair behind the desk. Stayed in the dark for a while. Didn't turn on the light.
Closed.
The word circled through my head. I didn't let it land anywhere specific, because I wasn't ready to admit what it pointed to. I was just handling something that needed handling. She was the mother of my child. She'd slipped from my sight for five years in a way I couldn't control. That was an information gap no family head should tolerate. So I had Carlo look into it. Nothing to do with anything else.
I picked up my phone. Opened Instagram.
Her account was still there. Same profile picture—that side profile, sunlight warming the blonde hair to gold. I scrolled down. Found the most recent post—two months ago. A photo of the shop. The glass storefront filled with flowers in every color. Sunlight slanting in from the side, that saturated golden light specific to southern France. Location tagged in that town near Provence. The one I'd already looked into.
The photo showed her hands. Holding a bunch of white daisies.Arranging them in a glass vase. Just hands. No face. But I recognized those hands.
Two months ago, she was still in France.
Carlo said the shop closed last week.
The last Instagram update was two weeks ago. Still in France. The shop closed last week. A one-week gap between the two. What happened in that gap, where she went, I didn't know yet.
But one thing was certain.
Even if she'd left that town, gone anywhere in the world she wanted to go, I wouldn't stop looking. Not ever.
I closed my eyes. Pushed the thought down.
The next day's meeting started at two in the afternoon.
The topic was a new Southeast Asia project. Three months of preliminary research. Today was the final round of discussion. Once we confirmed direction, we could move to execution. I sat at the head of the conference table, opened the folder in front of me, and signaled to begin.
Seven people in the room. Presentations were crisp. Data clear. First thirty minutes went smoothly.
Then I lost focus.
Not because something specific pulled me away. Just a thought drifting in, quietly blocking one tributary of attention. What Juliet said yesterday. Blonde hair, green eyes. The shop closed. Still tracking where she went...
Then something else. Something I'd deliberately not thought about last night.
Vivi.
Juliet called her Vivi.
Olivia.
Similar names.
Was this really just a coincidence?
"Mr. Visconti?"
