Erica Sinclair - The Vanishing Hour F/f

[Jenny_S]

Dear @Bandit666, thank you so much for your kind compliment.
I'm glad I could captivate you with this kind of a dark plot.

We will wrap the current story up tonight before starting a new Erica Sinclair adventure tomorrow evening.

[Jenny_S]

The scent of wood, leather, and lavender greets her as she steps into her apartment - a sharp contrast to the stale, suffocating air of Lorraine Tomlins’ basement.

A blur of fur barrels toward her. Spot and Tiger pounce on her hands, mewing, tiny tongues licking her face as if sensing something is wrong.
She kneels, scooping them up, burying her face in their warm little bodies. Their tiny hearts beat fast against her palms, but their world is simple. Safe.

She should feel safe now, too. But somehow, she doesn’t.

Mechanically, she goes through the motions - refilling their bowls, stroking their fur, murmuring soft reassurances. They eat with enthusiasm, tails flicking in contentment, blissfully unaware of the horrors lurking beyond these walls.

Her fingers drift to the wine rack in the kitchen. She selects a bottle without thinking, uncorking it. The deep red vino glides into the glass, dark as blood.
She takes a long sip, letting the Nero d’Avola bloom on her tongue, letting it burn a little as it slides down her throat, pooling in the pit of her empty stomach.

The window calls to her. She moves toward it, cradling the glass, watching the city outside. A world that keeps turning. A world that, just hours ago, had no idea Kristy Gordon was still alive.

Vera Atwood and Kristy Gordon were fourteen when they were taken. Fourteen!

Kristy lost two years being held in that basement. Two years of birthdays, holidays, school dances, summer afternoons. Two years of growing up in captivity, of forgetting what it means to be free.

Erica closes her eyes, gripping the glass tighter.
Then her gaze shifts - to the framed photo on the top shelf of the cabinet.
Her father, his arm around her mother, both smiling as if nothing in the world could touch them, and baby Erica toddling between them.

She wonders what her parents would say to her now. If she told them that neither her Harvard Law degree nor every hard-won lesson her father ever taught her had prepared her for what she saw today.

She had grown up knowing that monsters lurked in the world, but they had always been the kind of monsters who came for adults. The kind she could fight with the law. With reason. But this? This was something else entirely. Kristy and Vera were just kids. Stolen. Locked away. Lost to the world. And no one had even known where to look.

In her line of work, she has seen killers before. Con artists. Corrupt businessmen. But Lorraine Tomlins wasn’t any of those things. In her own way, she was something different: a grieving mother who had let her sorrow rot into madness.
Erica had spent years believing that every crime had a motive, but this one felt like looking into a black hole. Lorraine hadn’t taken Kristy and Vera for money or power or revenge. She had taken them out of love, however misguided. And somehow, that made it so much worse.

Staring at the photo, it suddenly hits her with overwhelming clarity - compared to what Kristy and Vera endured, her own exhaustion, her own unease, means nothing.

She downs the rest of the wine and sets the glass down on the coffee table.
Too hard.
The effect of the alcohol - on an empty stomach - slithers through her veins, making the world tilt, just slightly.
She sways on her feet.
Enough.

In the bedroom, she strips off her clothes, discarding them without care, then slips into her black silk kimono, the fabric whispering against her skin.

Padding back into the living room, she lowers herself onto the polished hardwood floor. Legs crossed, hands outstretched.
It takes only seconds before Spot and Tiger nudge their tiny heads into her palms.
She strokes them absentmindedly, letting their warmth seep into her skin.
This.

This is the only comfort she wants tonight.


~~~


Morning arrives after a deep, dreamless sleep. No nightmares. No fractured glimpses of a dark basement or a pair of blank, haunted eyes. Just silence.

As Erica blinks against the soft light of her bedside lamp, she feels the weight of exhaustion in her limbs, but she knows that the world always keeps turning.
She won’t let herself sink into darkness - not when Kristy and Vera have just begun their long road back from it.

She stretches, exhales, and moves. Routine is a comfort she won’t abandon today.
The kittens are up, too, chirping their greeting, weaving around her ankles as she prepares their food. Spot bats at her wrist playfully, oblivious to the horrors of the world beyond these walls. For a brief moment, she envies them.

Then, dressed in her black running gear, she hits the pavement, her strides strong, focused. This morning, she runs harder than she has in years. She pushes herself onward, away from the images that have carved themselves into her mind. When she finally stops, breathless, she checks her smartwatch - she’s beaten her best time by thirty-seven seconds.
Later, showered and steady, she dresses sharply in her signature crisp professional style. But this time, alongside her blazer and heels, she also packs a travel bag.
Because she isn’t going back to the office today.


~~~


At the 60th Precinct, Erica deposits her travel bag in the trunk of her black Volvo before dialing a familiar number.
“Good morning, Erica.” Claire’s voice is warm, expectant. She knows when her boss calls before coming to the office, something is up. “What can I do for you?”

Erica leans against the car, her fingers absently tracing the edge of her phone. Surely, Claire won’t say no - not when the kittens are involved. But courtesy demands she still asks.
“I’d like to take some time off till the weekend.” A pause. “You can reach me if the office is on fire, but I was wondering…”

“Of course,” Claire cuts in smoothly.
Erica can hear the soft scrape of a drawer opening – Claire is checking for the spare key to her apartment. “I’ll look after Spot and Tiger while you’re away.”

A weight lifts from Erica’s chest. Her four walls, her small creatures - they’ll be in the best hands possible.
“Thank you, Claire. You’re a star.”

“Anything for you.” There’s a smile in her voice, and for the first time since Christian Gordon walked into her office the other day, Erica manages a small one of her own.


~~~


At the precinct, giving her statement doesn’t take long.
But it isn’t easy.
The words come out measured, factual - the lawyer in her knows how to build a precise, airtight account. But the images now playing before her inner eye don’t care about structure:
Vera, tied to that chair, her wrists raw, the strip of tape hanging from her blistered lips.
Kristy, staring through her, the void behind her eyes swallowing everything whole.

The weight of it presses into her chest like a stone.

Detective Landham watches her closely, then offers her a piece of gum. Maybe playing the cool guy is his way of coping with things like these.
“Take it easy,” he advises, and for a moment, she considers telling him that’s exactly what she’s planning to do.
Instead, she just nods.


~~~


The drive north is both peaceful and heavy.
She tunes the radio in on a smooth jazz station, but the music feels wrong, too polished, too artificial. She turns it off and drives in silence.
The tension in her body uncoils slowly. Mile by mile, the city falls away, replaced by rolling fields and quiet roads.
When she finally turns onto the gravel driveway of Ironwood Pastures, something inside her loosens.

The moment she steps into the stable, the scent of hay, leather, and earth wraps around her like an embrace.
She finds Lea in her stall, her deep brown coat gleaming, ears flicking forward in recognition.
And just like that, Erica releases a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.

She brushes the mare down, feeling the strong muscles beneath her hands, relishing the simple ritual of it. Then, dressed in jodhpurs and tall boots, she leads Lea out into the crisp air.
No courtroom. No flashing lights. No locked doors hiding horrors.
Just this.

As she swings into the saddle, the world narrows to the rhythm of hooves against the soil and the wind whispering through the trees.
She doesn’t have to solve how she feels. Not today. Not here.
She doesn’t know if Kristy will ever heal, if Vera will ever sleep without nightmares again.
But they’re alive.
And for now, that has to be enough.



The End
…but Erica Sinclair will return in the gripping thriller “Erica Sinclair – The Range War”

[Caesar73]

Truly fascinating last Chapter. Indeed, there seems no real Culprit here. One can see the Librarian as a Victim. A Victim of Fate. Erica is right. There is no classical Motive here. Instead Tomlins wants just her Family back. One can feel for her - in some ways. Yet the Fact remains: She robbed a young Woman of two Years of her Life. What a gripping Tale!

[LunaDog]

A true 'masterpiece' of a story. Superbly told as usual from you.

[Jenny_S]

Dear @Caesar73, dear @LunaDog, thank you so much for the compliments. I know, this story has a bit of an open end, but I left it like this on purpose so every reader can choose if the girls heal and find closure. I, of course, wish them well.