Ilse winced as she shouldered the plastic bag provided by the hospital and stepped into her apartment for the first time in three days.
The small, quaint space was the same as when she'd last rushed out in search of Alexandra. Her computer was still on, the screen having long since gone idle, but the blue lights on the power strip still flashing. At least she hadn't left the wood-burning stove on.
She let out a little sigh, lowering her hospital bag and shutting the door behind her, making sure it was locked.
While the apartment looked the same, it also carried the same ominous air as the last time she'd been here.
She stared into the dark corners of the living room, towards the shadows of the kitchen.
No movement. Simply silence.
And yet...
She swallowed, her throat still raw as if she'd swallowed acid. They hadn't found a body.
No remains.
Sawyer had insisted this was common. She wanted to believe him, desperately.
But she wasn't sure she could be convinced.
Why hadn't there been a body?
What if... what if...
She shivered at the thought, but as she did, her eyes moved towards the single square piece of paper laying on the ground in front of her. Her expression flickered and she slowly dropped to a knee, trying to keep her right side from too much motion. The burns hadn't been severe enough for skin grafts, but they still hurt like hell.
As she stared at the postcard, she felt a flicker of frustration.
Moving to the city had been a mistake.
She'd thought she'd been fleeing her problems.
Really, she was just chasing them.
She was already feeling uncomfortable, even in this new place, still not fully unpacked. Moving here had been foolish. Ilse knew now she'd never be able to move until she put her past to rest. No one else would do it for her.
How long would that take, though?
She lifted the postcard, turning it slowly to glance at the taunting message on the back.
“Hola! Why leave so soon?”
An airy, light comment brimming with sadism. Someone wanted her to know they were watching her. Someone wanted her to realize they were tracking her every movement.
Hola.
So cheerful, so playful. Intended to communicate a light-hearted air...
She stared, scowling at the postcard, her eyes fixed. For a moment, she felt the desire to rip it to pieces. But what good would that do? Perhaps, instead of reacting emotionally, she ought to enlist the aid of some of her new friends. Maybe Rudiger, with all his know how, might be able to trace the postcard.
So instead, she got back to her feet and limped over to the kitchen table, sighing as she settled in the chair and tossed the postcard behind her computer screen. Out of sight, out of mind.
She lowered into the chair facing the desktop and sat still in silence, enjoying the quiet for a moment.
It was nice not to have any obligations.
Nice not to feel the pressure of bodies dropping like sand in an hourglass.
For the moment, at least, she wasn't responsible for another human's life... or death.
It felt nice to be free of that...
She'd thought by joining the agency, she'd be able to help...
But now, more than ever, she felt the weight of the role she'd taken.
She swallowed and leaned back in her chair closing her eyes for a moment, tilting her head. This was the first chance she'd had, since Donovan had called, to simply relax. To allow her mind to wander.
Normally, she didn't approve of the routes her subconscious took. Didn't like following her own train of thought—it didn't go through particularly nice neighborhoods.
But sometimes...
It was important to listen to one’s subliminal thoughts. And so Ilse just sat, waiting, thinking.
Her mind, nearly inevitably, was drawn back to that prison cell in Germany. Back to her father. Back to his arm jutting through the cell door, blood spilling down his wrist and fingers. She thought to his shouts. Shouts about Hilda. About his “sacred family...”
She frowned at the thought, eyes still closed.
There had been nothing particularly sacred about her family nor about their upbringing. They'd never set foot inside a church while trapped in that basement. Exposing his children to the outside world would have been too risky, so Gerald Mueller had kept them locked away.
Along with his girlfriend... Ilse's “stepmom.” She scowled now, her eyes still closed, feeling a sort of comforting weight of her eyebrows bunching up, the tickle of her eyelashes against her skin.
Sacred family...
What had he meant by that?
He'd gone on and on about finding Hilda... finding her... finding... After she'd escaped? After she'd grown up?
Her father hadn't even recognized her. Hadn't recognized her name. Not until she'd brushed her hair over her ear in that nervous tic.
But what about this sacred family...
It stood out for some reason. Something he'd said? Something she remembered from her past... Something...
Ilse licked her lips slowly, considering it, trying to focus. Her mind began to wander, drifting once more back to that truck in the parking lot outside the antique store. Once more considering her father. The way her small fingers had wrapped around the seatbelt. The way her stepmother had shouted...
She remembered the brochure as well... the one gripped in her stepmother's hand. The one she hadn't been able to picture in the dream. The one she'd used as a fan while at the same time commanding Gerald to hurt his daughter...
The brochure...
Ilse's eyebrows bunched now. She swallowed slowly, her thoughts drifting. She just couldn't...quite...place...
She inhaled for a moment, and then reached behind her desktop screen, her fingers scrambling over cables. She kept her eyes closed, her mind focused. She found the edge of the postcard, avoiding the thick, rubber cable. She pulled the postcard and held it up.
Murmuring beneath her breath, she said, “This is your stepmother.”
She held the postcard, thinking of it as that gray form in her memory. Of that horrible nemesis upstairs, that raining cloud. Displacing the emotion. Attempting to bypass the memory block. She'd done it once before, successfully, with a woman who'd survived a killer in a national park.
Ilse crumpled the postcard then and tossed it across the room, sight unseen.
Then she waited.
Her mind was still going wild. Her eyes still closed.
The gray figure was still gray. She couldn't make out the woman's face. Couldn't make out much. But her attention kept diverting to the brochure in her stepmother's hand.
Why? Why?
Sacred family.
Why?
She wanted to scream. Her side was aching in pain. It ached when she moved. Ached when she didn't. Ached when she lay down and when she stood up.
So much pain.
And yet she forced herself to focus. Forced herself not to get distracted.
Why?
Why?
Sacred family...
The gray figure in her memory was still distant, still out of reach.
But as Ilse stared. As she focused on the memory, as some of the fear slipped, momentarily to the side. She glimpsed the title of the brochure.
Sagrada Familia...
An image on the front. A large church.
Sagrada Familia.
Ilse swallowed, frowning, her brow wrinkling. The memory faded, the image vanishing.
Sagrada...
Familia...
Sacred. Family.
Hola.
Ilse's eyes snapped open. She stared at the crumpled postcard by the door. Hola. The greeting had been Hola. The picture had been of Germany. It had been sent to Seattle. But the greeting had been Hola.
Her father had kept going on about the sacred family.
But what if he hadn't been referring to their horribly dysfunctional family. What if he'd been talking about that brochure... Somehow, some way, her mind had brought the memory back. For the first time, it almost felt like her subconscious was helping.
Sagrada Familia.
Ilse frowned, clicking on the screen to her already roused desktop and waiting for the internet to connect. Once it did, she typed into the search bar the exact two words she'd read on that brochure. She could still picture the large structure on front, shifting back and forth as her stepmother had used it for a fan.
The first search result caused Ilse to freeze stiff.
The Sagrada Familia... A famous church in Barcelona.
Hola.
Was that... could it be possible that... Was her stepmother there? Was that why her father had been so obsessed with it? Was the Hola just a taunt? Or was her subconscious, her gut trying to tell her something. Take captive every thought.
Her name meant pledged to God.
She hadn't grown up in a sacred family, but she was a protector now. Burned or not, having gone through hell or otherwise, sometimes... it almost felt like something was directing her, guiding her.
“Hola,” she murmured at the computer screen.
Barcelona. That was where her stepmother would be. Ilse felt nearly certain of it. The woman who'd controlled her father. The shrew who'd lived upstairs. Ilse could barely remember her. Barely remember the horrible creature who'd ensnared Gerald Mueller.
What had made the woman so terrible that even someone as versed in pain as Hilda couldn't remember?
The Sagrada Familia.
That was where she needed to go. That was where she would look for answers now.
And now, due to her leave because of her injuries, Ilse could go straight to the source... She returned her attention to her computer, wincing as she did. Her fingers hovered over the keys, one hand gripping the mouse. She would have to arrange for online counseling sessions with a couple of her clients in the coming week.
But also... She needed information. For one: how much did it cost to buy a plane ticket to Barcelona?