Chapter 5 - THE EIGHTH FRAME
"Those photographs are all I have left of my father."
Evelyn tried to push herself upright.
Pain immediately shot through her abdomen.
Dr. Lawson, who had returned to examine her, placed a gentle hand on her shoulder.
"Mrs. Cross, you cannot leave this hospital."
"They're going to destroy his work."
"I understand you're upset. But you've just undergone major surgery."
Evelyn looked toward Adrien.
"Then stop them."
He nodded.
"I will."
She caught his sleeve before he could leave.
"Not by threatening people. Not by making somebody disappear. I want those photographs protected properly, where nobody can take them away again."
Adrien met her eyes.
"Then that's how we'll do it."
For once, he understood that the way he handled a problem mattered as much as solving it.
At eight the next morning, Adrien and Marcus arrived at Bell House Gallery.
The building stood on a quiet Manhattan street, its tall windows displaying paintings, sketches, and photographs collected over three generations.
Evelyn had spent years restoring it.
Adrien had paid for repairs when the roof leaked, but the gallery remained entirely hers.
That distinction suddenly mattered to him.
Anna Price, Evelyn's gallery manager, met them at the entrance.
"Mr. Cross, the removal team has already been here."
Adrien stopped.
"When?"
"Six-thirty."
Marcus looked at his watch.
"Two and a half hours early."
Anna led them downstairs to the temperature-controlled archive.
Several storage shelves stood empty.
But an elderly man wearing a brown cardigan sat beside a large wooden table.
Samuel Rourke.
Gabriel Bell's longtime photography assistant.
He was seventy-four, thin, and stubborn enough to have once refused a million-dollar offer for a collection of old harbor photographs.
When he saw Adrien, he stood.
"You're late."
Adrien looked around.
"Where are the originals?"
"Safe, for now."
Samuel pointed toward a reinforced storage cabinet.
"I refused to release them without speaking to Evelyn personally. The men showed me her signature. I told them I had known her since she was seven and wasn't about to believe she'd ordered her father's work destroyed."
Marcus inspected the cabinet.
"Did they take anything?"
Samuel's expression hardened.
"One contact sheet. That's all they managed before I stopped them."
"Which one?"
"Sheet B. The Pier Fourteen sequence."
Adrien frowned.
"What was special about it?"
Samuel opened a protective folder.
Inside lay seven small black-and-white photographs arranged in two rows.
The eighth space was empty.
"Gabriel took eight exposures that night," Samuel explained. "The first seven show the warehouse, the trucks, and the men gathering outside."
He pointed toward the vacant space.
"The eighth showed someone standing beside the rear fire exit just before the alarm sounded."
Adrien looked at the empty square.
"Who?"
Samuel shook his head.
"I never developed a large print. Gabriel told me the image could ruin a powerful family."
"Did he say which family?"
Samuel looked directly at Adrien.
"Yours."
Back at St. Catherine's, Evelyn was allowed to visit the neonatal unit in a wheelchair.
Her son lay inside a clear bassinet beneath the nurses' watchful eyes.
The extra breathing support had been removed.
A tiny sensor remained attached to his foot.
Evelyn rested her fingertips against his hand.
"Look at you," she whispered. "Already making everybody worry."
The baby curled his fingers around one of hers.
She smiled.
Then she cried.
A nurse handed her a tissue.
"He's doing better every hour."
"Thank you."
Evelyn stayed until her strength began to fade.
When she returned to her room, she found a small paper bag waiting on her table.
Inside were two knitted yellow hats.
She recognized them immediately.
Adrien had bought them during a weekend trip to Vermont.
He had insisted the babies needed something brighter than the white and blue clothes everyone kept giving them.
Evelyn touched the soft yarn.
A note lay underneath.
I can't give them back the first hours I missed. But I will be here for every hour you allow me to share.
Adrien.
Evelyn read the note twice.
Then she placed it beside her bed.
She wasn't ready to forgive him.
But she didn't throw it away.
That afternoon, Samuel brought the remaining contact sheet to the hospital.
He wore white cotton gloves as he placed the photographs beneath a portable magnifying lens.
Evelyn studied them carefully.
In the seventh image, her father had photographed a loading truck near the warehouse.
A man stood beside its open door.
His face was hidden.
But his right hand rested against the metal frame.
On his finger was a large gold ring bearing the Cross family crest.
Evelyn leaned closer.
"That's the ring."
Adrien recognized it.
His father had worn that ring for thirty years.
After Michael Cross died, Adrien had placed it inside the family safe.
At least, that was what he believed.
Samuel slowly turned over the contact sheet.
Gabriel had written a short note in pencil.
FRAME 8 — THE HAND AT THE EXIT. ASK WHO HAD THE KEY.
Beneath it was another notation.
V.R. — 2:14 A.M.
Marcus stared at the letters.
Adrien looked at Samuel.
"V.R.?"
The older man nodded.
"Gabriel told me the initials belonged to someone working inside the Cross organization."
Adrien felt the answer forming before anyone said it.
Victor Raines.
His most trusted lieutenant.
The man who had spent seventeen years standing beside him.
But Samuel wasn't finished.
He removed a small photograph from the back of the folder.
"This was taken six months after the fire."
It showed Victor standing at a private waterfront gathering.
On his right hand was Michael Cross's gold signet ring.
Evelyn looked at Adrien.
"You said that ring was locked in your family safe."
Adrien stared at the photograph.
"That's where I put it."
Samuel's face tightened.
"Then somebody opened that safe."
He turned the photograph over.
May you like
Across the back, Gabriel Bell had written one final sentence.
If anything happens to me, find out why Michael Cross gave Victor the key.
