“What important matter kept you from attending the board meeting today, may I ask?” a woman’s voice sounded with a distinct hint of derision.

  The corner of Ralph’s mouth twitched.

  “Did I miss much?” he asked, without bothering to answer.

  The woman sighed, then chuckled.

  “There was something delicious you might have enjoyed.”

  “But you saved a couple of pieces for me, didn’t you?” Ralph suggested, matching her playful tone.

  The woman paused for a moment and then said slowly,

  “Well… yes.”

  “So, can I pick them up?” Ralph asked lightly.

  “Perhaps. Will you buy me dinner?” she suggested.

  “Mmm… I can.” Ralph let out an exaggeratedly loud sigh. “But be reasonable. You have more money than I do.”

  “Oh, really?” The woman’s voice sounded genuinely surprised.

  “Of course. You have all of yours, and all of Father’s, haven’t you?”

  “Are you jealous?” the woman asked softly.

  “If we speak about money — yes,” Ralph replied.

  “You could just honestly admit that you simply don’t like paying,” she teased.

  “Sure,” Ralph replied flatly. “Rich people are rich because they never pay. Ever heard of that?”

  The woman laughed.

  “Of course. Ever since I was a kid.”

  “I heard that for the first time today.” A slight smile played on Ralph’s lips. “I always wondered, did we have different childhoods?”

  The woman didn’t answer. She grew quiet and then said in a businesslike, flat tone,

  “Actually, today I am busy. Father wants me at home.”

  “Me too?”

  “He didn’t say anything about you.”

  The slight smile on Ralph’s face became crooked.

  “I can have lunch with you tomorrow,” the woman said curtly. “I’ll send you the time and location.”

  Then she hung up without saying goodbye or waiting for a reply.

  For some time, Ralph stared at the blank screen with a fixed gaze. Then he placed it back on the dashboard and leaned back with the look of someone who had finished a very difficult job.

  “Are you going to meet your sister?” Demis asked.

  Ralph nodded.

  Demis frowned.

  The last time Ralph had lunch with Vella, it had ended in an abduction. He had narrowly survived.

  The investigation still yielded no significant results. The investigation into this case had reached a dead end. Demis felt personally responsible, both for the failure of the investigation and for the kidnapping itself.

  But there was no one closer to Ralph than Vella in the entire Denhof household...

  “Okay. I will be around,” Demis said.

  He had no desire to let his boss go anywhere alone.

  But Ralph shook his head.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  “You will be busy,” he said casually. He opened the book lying on his lap.

  Demis snorted irritably.

  “You’ll be at the airport by that time,” Ralph continued. “The plane arrives at 12:15.”

  This wasn’t unexpected. Over the past three weeks, Demis had already met several people Ralph had summoned to Nineveh. They’d arrived one or two at a time, so as not to attract attention.

  All of these were people who had been working for Ralph for a long time, mostly in Minoan and Impresso, where most of Bianca Denhof’s personal funds had been invested. These were people he trusted, and so he had left them with his mother when he was forced to leave for Nineveh at his father’s request.

  Now he called them almost reluctantly. As if forced. Trying to get by with the bare minimum.

  “Who is arriving this time?” Demis asked.

  The car pulled into the Denhof Corp parking lot. Ralph closed the book he had been staring at blankly and answered:

  “Dagmar.”

  It was more than Demis could bear. He slammed the brakes. Ralph’s smartphone slid across the dashboard with a clatter and bounced off the windshield.

  The car stopped.

  Ralph kept his hand on the seat belt, giving Demis a questioning look, clearly in no hurry to unbuckle.

  “Sorry,” Demis muttered without a hint of remorse in his voice.

  Then he remarked sullenly,

  “You said slavery was forbidden,”

  “Did I?” Ralph asked casually.

  “Definitely. Back then, in Minoan.”

  Ralph opened the car door.

  “We are not in Minoan anymore,” he said, stepping out.

  Demis also got out of the car, still frowning. He had no desire whatsoever to deal with Dagmar again.

  Of course, Ralph didn't care about that.

  “Find a good hotel closer to the center,” he instructed Demis in a flat, business-like tone. “Make sure the Denhofs aren’t among the owners.”

  Demis nodded.

  “And Stavrakis, too,” Ralph added after a moment’s thought.

  Demis nodded again, silently.

  When it came to Dagmar, Demis preferred to keep his mouth shut. This had become a habit over the years of working with Ralph.

  “By the way, slavery is indeed prohibited,” Ralph continued. “So let Arthur open another anonymous box in Banca Argentieri and double the deposit.”

  “Double?” Demis’s irritation finally burst out. “But life in Nineveh is three times cheaper than in Minoan!”

  A fleeting smile crossed Ralph’s face.

  “The climate is worse.”

  He opened the book again, took a photo, and, without taking his eyes off it, headed for the elevators.

  Demis caught up with him after a few steps and glanced at the photo over Ralph’s shoulder.

  There were two people there: a girl of eleven or twelve and a man in his forties. He stood gracefully, leaning on his cane and looking at the girl, his head slightly bowed. The girl looked straight into the camera and smiled from ear to ear. They stood at the edge of the road; behind them rose a green wall of forest.

  “Is it she? Abigail Martinez?” Demis asked after a short glance at the photo.

  Ralph looked at the girl silently for a while. She was bathed in sunlight from head to toe. Her face was radiant. There was nothing in her sparkling eyes that resembled the tired, distant eyes Ralph had seen through the narrow opening between her surgical mask and cap.

  However, he was certain that the girl in the photo was indeed Abigail Martinez.

  The lift arrived. They went inside.

  “Do you really think she went on the run?” Demis asked, looking at Ralph, who was still staring at the photo.

  “It’s possible.”

  “Because of that extortion thing?” Demis chuckled incredulously. “What nonsense. No lawyer would take on something like that.”

  “I don’t think Ms. Martinez has met many lawyers in her life,” Ralph said, obviously thinking about something else. “But she’s certainly encountered the police; she couldn’t help it, living in that neighbourhood. And so she knows what she’s afraid of.”

  Demis shook his head in disbelief.

  “Can it be the same forest?” Ralph murmured, as if to himself.

  Demis glanced at the photo again. A forest was a forest. All trees looked alike.

  The lift doors opened. Ralph seemed to wake up, slid the photo back into the book, and stepped out.

  “I’ll have to pay a visit to that woman — Mr. Willowby’s widow,” he said.

  “Do you think she might know where Abigail Martinez is?” Demis asked.

  “I hope she doesn’t. Otherwise, the police would have already found her,” Ralph said. “That would be a shame. I wanted to be the first.”

  “Then why?”

  “To return the book.”

  Then he disappeared behind the door of his office.

  Demis stood there for a moment, staring at the door as if it were a book snapped shut at the most interesting part.