The connection was cut off. Silence. The message “Call ended” flashed on my phone screen. I tried calling him back. No signal. Once again. Nothing. It was as if his number had disappeared from the face of the earth.
I stood in the middle of the unfamiliar street, his words echoing in my mind. “You have…” What did I have? What on earth could I have that would provoke such a reaction in him? In the man who never lost his temper. I felt the fear that had gripped me on the train return with new, monstrous force. It was no longer just fear of a stare. It was something much bigger, much darker. And I was at the center of it.
Chapter 2
The world around me seemed to fall apart. The deserted street, the peeling buildings, the gray sky – everything merged into one shapeless mass of menace. The only real thing was the throbbing panic in my chest and the echo of Peter's last words. What did I have?
Instinctively, I grabbed my bag. It was a regular leather bag that I carried every day. It contained a wallet, keys, phone, book, cosmetics… nothing out of the ordinary. I began rummaging frantically, dumping the contents onto one of the benches next to me. The items scattered with a clanking noise. Nothing. Absolutely nothing that looked unusual or valuable in any way.
Then my fingers found something hard and rectangular, tucked into an inside zippered pocket I almost never used. I took it out. It was an ordinary brown folder, the kind of cardboard ones you get at any bookstore. I didn't remember putting it there. I opened it. Inside were several sheets of paper, densely written with numbers, tables, and text that at first glance seemed like meaningless corporate jargon. Names of companies I didn't know, account numbers, dates.
How did this folder end up in my bag? A memory from that morning surfaced in my mind. Peter was unusually tense. He was pacing around the apartment like a lion in a cage while I was getting ready for work. He was talking on the phone in a muffled, angry voice. At one point, as I was putting on my shoes in the hallway, he hurried past me. He tripped, my bag, which had been left on the floor by the door, opened, and some of my things scattered. He quickly bent down to pick them up, apologizing absentmindedly. “Be careful, Annie,” he had said, “you’re distracted today.” And in fact, he was the one who was shaking. Was it then? Was it then, in this staged moment of distraction, that he had slipped the folder into my bag?
But why? Why would he do it without telling me? And why would it cause such a panic now?
And then everything fell into place. The man on the train. He wasn't looking at me. He was looking at my bag. He knew. He knew what was inside. And I, by getting off the train early, had messed up his plans. I had messed up everyone's plans.
