THE CHRISTMAS WITNESS

The air in the room vanished.

I stared at the photograph of my dead daughter, my thumb trembling against the cold silver of the locket.

Juniper. Her bright green eyes. That blue balloon from her fourth birthday party.

“Norah,” I rasped, my voice barely recognizable to my own ears. I held out the open locket. “Who is this woman?”

Norah leaned forward, her brow furrowing. “That’s my mama. Elise.”

Elise.

The name hit me like a physical blow. Three years ago, when Juniper’s heart condition rapidly worsened, we hired a private, round-the-clock pediatric nurse. Her name was Elise. She was kind, brilliant, and Juniper adored her.

But on the night Juniper died, Elise disappeared.

The police ruled it a sudden cardiac event. They said Elise likely panicked and fled to avoid a malpractice lawsuit. For three years, I had believed my daughter’s death was an unbearable, tragic act of nature.

Now, I was looking at a seven-year-old girl holding a rabbit, realizing my entire reality was a lie.

“Boss,” Malcolm interrupted, his phone pressed to his ear. His face was grim. “We found Elise’s car. It was towed to an impound lot on the south side.”

I snapped the locket shut, my grip tight enough to dig the metal into my palm. “Get the car ready. Now.”

I turned to Malcolm’s second-in-command, a silent enforcer named Cole. “You stay with Norah. Lock this floor down. Nobody enters. If Marcus shows his face, shoot him.”

Cole nodded.

Twenty minutes later, Malcolm and I pulled into the desolate, poorly lit impound lot near the railyards. The air smelled of rust and diesel fuel.

We didn’t go to the front office. We cut the chain-link fence at the back.

We found the section for fresh arrivals. We moved quickly between the rows of mangled metal.

“There,” Malcolm pointed.

It was a silver sedan. The front end was completely smashed in—the result of Marcus running her off the road.

But we were too late.

Flames were licking up from the interior. The smell of burning upholstery and melting plastic was suffocating. Someone had tossed an accelerant through the broken window.

“Damn it!” I cursed, rushing forward. The heat pushed me back.

“Marcus got here first,” Malcolm said, pulling his weapon and scanning the dark lot. “He’s destroying whatever he put in there.”

I refused to accept that. Elise had risked everything to keep something away from him.

I grabbed a heavy iron tire iron from a nearby scrapped truck. I ran to the trunk of Elise’s burning car, wedged the iron under the warped latch, and pulled with every ounce of strength I had left.

The metal shrieked, then snapped open.

Smoke billowed out, but the flames hadn’t fully reached the back yet.

I tore the trunk mat away. Underneath the spare tire, wedged into the metal frame, was a heavy, fireproof black lockbox.

I grabbed the handle. The metal seared my palm, but I yanked it free just as the gas tank ignited, throwing Malcolm and me backward onto the cold gravel.