Chapter 1 - SURVIVE FOR SIX MINUTESThe bathroom door had been expensive.
Solid walnut.
Custom hardware.
Italian lock.
Derek had bragged about it when we renovated the apartment.
None of that mattered once a forty-two-year-old man drove his shoulder into it hard enough.
The frame cracked on the third hit.
I was sitting on cold marble beside the bathtub.
My name is Lena Callahan.
I was thirty-seven that night.
Barefoot.
Gray sweatpants.
White tank top stained with blood from a split lip and the scrape along my shoulder.
My left arm was tucked hard against my body because moving it made white light explode behind my eyes.
I did not know whether it was broken.
I knew something was wrong.
Very wrong.
My phone shook in my right hand.
Outside:
BOOM.
The door flexed.
“Open it!”
I tried to move farther away.
There was nowhere to go.
Our apartment occupied half of the twenty-second floor of a luxury building on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
Three bedrooms.
Three and a half bathrooms.
Floor-to-ceiling windows.
Private elevator access.
A bathroom large enough to appear in design magazines.
And at 11:43 on a Thursday night, it felt smaller than a coffin.
Derek hit the door again.
“No one’s coming to save you!”
I looked at the number on my phone.
I had not called it in fourteen years.
I had almost deleted it a hundred times.
Instead I had transferred it from phone to phone under one letter.
V.
The call connected.
No greeting.
A man’s voice:
“Lena?”
My throat closed.
He recognized my number.
Or had it saved.
I didn’t know which frightened me more.
“Please.”
Another crash.
“Lena, where are you?”
I gave the address.
He interrupted after the apartment number.
“I know the building.”
Of course he did.
“Please… please save me?”
The words disgusted me when they came out.
Not because asking for help was weak.
Because I had spent my adult life making sure this was the one man I would never need to ask.
Silence for half a second.
Then:
“Survive for six minutes.”
The call stayed connected.
Derek hit the door again.
The lock broke.
Wood splintered inward.
I screamed and lifted my good arm over my face.
The door burst open.
Derek stood in the opening.
Black T-shirt.
Bare feet.
Blood on one knuckle.
His own.
From hitting the door.
He grabbed the broken frame and looked down at me.
Then he smiled.
“There you are.”
I pushed backward until my spine hit the wall.
“Stay away.”
“You called someone?”
I did not answer.
His eyes dropped to the phone.
“Who?”
I heard breathing through the speaker.
Vincent had not hung up.
Derek stepped inside.
“Give me the phone.”
“No.”
“Lena.”
“No.”
His smile widened.
“You still don’t understand.”
He came closer.
Then stopped.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway.
Slow.
Not running.
Three pairs.
Derek turned.
His face changed.
A man appeared beyond the shattered bathroom door.
Vincent Moretti.
Fifty-eight.
Silver beginning at his temples.
Black suit fitted so precisely it looked almost severe.
No tie.
White shirt.
No visible weapon.
Two men stood several feet behind him.
Both in dark suits.
Both silent.
Vincent did not look at me first.
He looked at Derek.
“Stay away from her.”
Derek stared.
Then laughed once.
Badly.
“Who the hell are you?”
Vincent took one step.
Derek’s confidence disappeared before my eyes.
Maybe he recognized the face.
Maybe the name.
Maybe only the kind of calm that does not need introduction.
Vincent looked past him.
His gaze found me.
My left arm.
My bloody shirt.
My swollen lip.
Something cold entered his expression.
Then he looked back at Derek.
“I hate people who beat women!”
The two men behind Vincent stepped into the doorway.
Derek said nothing.
I pressed my back against the bathroom wall.
And the scene froze there in my memory.
May you like
Not because I knew Vincent would save me.
Because I knew I had exactly one chance to decide what kind of saving I would accept.
Related Stories
