Page 61 of The Enforcer’s Pawn

Dmitri sets his hand close to mine but not touching. “Cara.”

The sound of my name pulls me back to the call, and the memory comes with it.

Evan’s voice comes back first, then Kathryn’s kitchen, then the blue lunchbox. Kathryn knew what it meant because I taught her. Mikhail knew what it meant because I needed him safe. Evan should have heard it as preschool nonsense and left it there.

Instead, he carried it somewhere.

My fingers tighten on the chair arm. Dmitri sees it, so I keep my face flat and stare at the screen again.

Yuri opens a recovered set of fragments. “We pulled what we could from Patrick’s side and from an old cloud backup tied to Mercer’s phone. It’s messy, but it gives us enough.”

A deleted calendar invite appears first.

Coffee, 4:30, North End.

A Wi-Fi login follows, pulled from a Boston coffee shop I know Patrick used. Then a payment app nickname.

E.Merc. Thanks for helping K relax.

My nails dig into my palm.

Yuri opens the last recovered fragment, and Patrick’s words sit on the screen in a broken line. The timestamp is from the morning after I vanished.

Ask her about the emergency phrase without making it weird.

I stare at it.

Patrick had been using Evan to collect pieces of my life. Evan didn’t need training, threats, or a gun. He only needed to feel included.

Patrick would buy coffee, ask about Kathryn, laugh at the right time, and make Evan feel useful. Evan would ask one casual question in Kathryn’s kitchen, carry the answer back, and never understand that he had handed Patrick something I built to keep Mikhail safe.

Dmitri leans closer. “What emergency phrase?”

I look at the screen, then at him. “Ask Patrick.”

“Cara.”

I turn my face toward him. “You already know enough to scare me. Don’t get greedy.”

His jaw sets. “Holding back gets people killed.”

“People I love are already in danger because Patrick collects family details, and men like you know how to use frightened people.”

Dmitri doesn’t answer at once. Around us, the room keeps moving. Keyboards click. A printer starts, then stops. Abramov’s deputies keep their eyes on their screens and pretend they’re not listening.

Dmitri looks at the recovered fragments. “Why go through Evan?”

Yuri’s fingers pause. “Because he was close to Kathryn.”

“No,” Dmitri says. “Patrick could find that part easily. Evan had access Kathryn didn’t know she was giving him.”

I look at the screen again.

I should tell them. Patrick wasn’t only asking about Kathryn after she had Mikhail. The ‘blue lunchbox’ was the only way I could move my son from half a world away. And now Patrick has the code.

Petrov steps in before Dmitri can start again. “Mercer works in finance operations for Halden Rowe Compliance Services.”

I know that name because Kathryn said it once while complaining about Evan’s hours. At the time, it meant nothing. A boring job, a boring company, a boyfriend who answered work calls during dinner.