At 8:43 AM, Sam Valecroft was sitting in the library.
He had been staring at the same page for nearly six minutes.
Not because he was reading it but because something about it was wrong.
The book was old enough that the pages had begun to yellow at the edges, and the title wasn’t particularly notable.
It was a psychology textbook, and the paragraph Sam was staring at was about selective attention, a concept he’d understood for years.
But one sentence near the bottom of the page stood out from the rest.
Sam read it again and again, his eyes narrowing with each repetition.
Someone had written in the margin.
Not recently, because the ink was faded, but it was there, nonetheless.
We notice what we are taught to notice.
Sam leaned back as a familiar voice cut through his thoughts.
“You’re doing that thing again.”
Sam looked up to see Claire standing across the table from him, two coffees in her hands.
“What thing?”
“The thing where you stare at something like you’re trying to determine whether it killed your parents.”
Ollie appeared behind her, raising an eyebrow.
“That’s oddly specific.”
Claire set one of the coffees down in front of Sam before sliding into the seat across from him.
“He’s been staring at that book for six minutes.”
Ollie sat down next to Claire, regarding the book with mild interest.
“Maybe the book did kill his parents.”
Sam turned to glare at him, but Ollie’s expression was amused.
“Okay, probably not.”
Claire frowned at the book, tilting her head.
“What are you looking at?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s never an answer when you say it like that.”
Sam closed the book, and Claire’s eyes snapped to his face.
“See?”
“What?”
“That.”
“What?”
“You closed the book.”
“Yes.”
“Which means there was something.”
Ollie leaned forward, eyes locked on Sam’s.
“She’s right.”
Sam turned to face them both, raising an eyebrow.
“You two have become unnecessarily observant.”
“You’re a bad influence,” Claire said.
“I’ve been told.”
Ollie tapped the closed book with a finger.
“So?”
Sam hesitated, considering his options.
He decided against lying.
“Someone wrote something in the margin.”
Claire immediately became interested.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“What does it say?”
Sam opened the book and showed them the page, and Claire’s expression darkened as she read the sentence.
It wasn’t a huge change, but Sam caught it, and so did Ollie.
He caught it because he was looking at Claire, and she caught it because she was looking at Ollie.
Nobody said anything for a moment.
Finally, Claire exhaled slowly.
“That’s strange.”
“Why?” Sam asked.
“Because I’ve seen that sentence before.”
Sam’s eyes snapped to hers.
“Where?”
Claire frowned, her gaze flickering over the page.
“I’m not sure.”
“Think.”
“Sam,” Claire said carefully.
“What?”
“You’re doing the thing.”
“What thing?”
“Interrogating people before breakfast.”
Ollie raised his coffee mug in mock salute.
“Technically, it’s after breakfast.”
“Maybe it was somewhere on campus.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Claire.”
She looked up at him.
“I said I don’t know.”
Sam studied her face, searching for something he wasn’t sure he wanted to find.
He didn’t find it, exactly, but he found something close when Ollie spoke.
“Wait.”
They both turned to look at him.
“I know where.”
Sam turned back to him.
“The psychology building.”
“Where?”
“The old corridor.”
Claire frowned.
“The one nobody uses?”
“Exactly.”
Sam’s expression didn’t change, but something in his chest did.
The old corridor.
The same place where Edward’s photograph had led him to a question he still hadn’t answered.
The same place where, yesterday, Professor Holloway had casually mentioned that some records predated Blackthorn University itself.
Sam looked back at Claire.
“How do you know the corridor?”
Ollie shrugged.
“Because I got lost there.”
Claire stared at him.
“You got lost inside a building you’ve been attending for two years?”
“It was dark.”
“It was three in the afternoon.”
“Emotionally dark.”
Sam almost smiled.
Almost.
His phone vibrated in his hand, and he looked down at it.
Unknown number.
One text message.
You should stop looking for things that were never meant to be found.
Sam read it twice, once out loud and once to himself, before showing it to Claire.
Ollie’s teasing expression vanished as he looked over Sam’s shoulder, and Claire leaned in to see it as well.
“Who sent it?” she asked.
“Unknown number.”
“Can you trace it?” Claire asked.
Sam looked to Ollie, who shook his head immediately.
“No.”
“Why not?” Claire asked.
“Because I’m a psychology student, not MI6.”
Claire took the phone from Sam’s hands.
“Could be someone messing with you.”
“Yes,” Sam said.
“Could be connected to yesterday.”
“Yes,” Sam said again.
“Could be nothing.”
“Yes,” Sam said for the third time.
Claire stared at him.
“Do you have any answer that isn’t yes?”
“Several,” Sam said.
“Great.
Give me one.”
Sam took the phone back, his expression unreadable.
“No.”
Ollie leaned forward, lowering his voice.
__
“I know.”
__
Sam stood up, and Claire immediately looked up at him.
“Where are you going?”
“Nowhere.”
“You stood up.”
“I was sitting.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Sam looked toward the doors of the library, watching as students filtered in and out of the building.
Nothing at all.
A professor passed by with a stack of papers, and a student dropped a pen on the floor, but other than that, everything was normal.
Other than the man standing just outside the doors.
Sam stopped, his gaze locking onto the stranger’s face.
He was older, with a dark coat, but nothing about him seemed particularly noteworthy.
Nothing, except that he wasn’t looking at Sam.
The man was looking in the glass, at Sam’s reflection.
Sam didn’t move as the stranger turned around and walked away.
Claire watched him go.
“You know him?”
“No.”
“Then why are you staring?”
“I’m not.”
“You absolutely are.”
Ollie peered out the window.
“Who?”
“Nobody,” Sam said.
“Sam.”
He finally sat back down.
Claire lowered her voice.
“Is this connected to your father?”
The question was different this time, and Sam looked up at her, his expression unreadable.
Claire didn’t back down, and Ollie didn’t make a joke.
Sam thought about Edward, about the photograph, about the question he’d never answered.
About the warning he’d just received.
He thought about all of it before looking back at Claire and Ollie.
“No.”
It was a lie, and Claire knew it.
Ollie probably knew it, too.
But neither of them said anything.
Sam opened the book again, his eyes scanning the page.
We notice what we are taught to notice.
He turned the page, then the next, and the next, until he stopped.
There was a small indentation in the paper, barely noticeable.
Not writing, but something else.
Something had been written on the page above it, and Sam tilted the book toward the window, watching as the indentation became more apparent.
The first move is rarely made by the person you see.
Sam’s eyes went wide, and Claire leaned over his shoulder to see it.
Ollie whispered, “What does it mean?”
Sam didn’t answer, because suddenly, he understood.
The message on his phone hadn’t been a warning, after all.
It had been a distraction.
Someone wanted him to look in one place, and they’d done a good job of it.
The anonymous text, the man outside the library, the strange writing in the book.
It was all there, all visible, all too obvious.
Sam slowly closed the book.
Across the library, someone stood up from their seat.
Not unusual, really, except that they hadn’t been there when Sam arrived.
Sam watched the stranger as they walked toward the doors, and he didn’t stop them when they reached the threshold.
He didn’t call after them, or stop them, or do anything at all, really.
Claire followed his gaze.
“Sam?”
He didn’t look at her.
The student paused at the doors, their head tilting slightly, as if they were listening.
They weren’t looking at Sam, but at the book in his hands.
Sam’s expression darkened, and Claire’s brow furrowed.
“What?”
Sam finally looked at her.
“Nothing.”
“Sam.”
He took a sip of his coffee, watching the student as they turned away.
“Someone wanted me to find that sentence.”
Ollie frowned.
“Why?”
Sam looked up at the empty doorway.
“That’s the wrong question.”
Claire waited, but Sam’s gaze was fixed on the book.
“The question is…” he paused, exhaling slowly “…what did they want me to do after I found it?”
Outside, the world carried on as normal.
Students hurried to their classes, and cars passed by on the road, but somewhere in the depths of Blackthorn University, someone had just made their first move.
And Sam Valecroft had decided not to make the second.
TO BE CONTINUED……