Chapter 9
Daniel replayed the message.
Emma watched his face darken with every second.
Richard Whitmore looked like a grandfather.
That was what made him terrifying.
No gun.
No shouting.
No panic.
Just a quiet old man sitting in Daniel’s ballroom as if he still owned everything.
Maybe he did.
The video ended.
Michael leaned back against the hospital pillow.
“That’s him.”
Daniel looked over.
“You’re sure?”
“I never saw him clearly before.”
“You said Victor brought him.”
“Usually I heard them outside.”
Michael swallowed.
“But that voice. Yes.”
Daniel turned away.
Emma knew what he was thinking.
His uncle had attended birthdays.
Funerals.
Business meetings.
Richard had comforted Lily after Daniel vanished.
He had probably hugged her.
While knowing exactly where her father was.
Daniel called Brooks.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
His face changed.
“Call Lily.”
Emma tried the number Brooks had given her.
Straight to voicemail.
Daniel’s panic rose.
“Again.”
She called.
Nothing.
The state captain entered.
“We lost contact with the detail protecting your daughter fifteen minutes ago.”
Daniel stared.
“What?”
“We’re locating them.”
“You lost my child?”
“The vehicles were returning toward a secure state facility when communications dropped.”
Daniel lunged toward him.
Emma grabbed Daniel’s arm.
“Stop.”
The captain continued.
“We found one escort vehicle abandoned.”
Daniel’s face drained.
“Lily?”
“No sign.”
Michael whispered, “Richard.”
Daniel slammed his fist into the wall.
Emma felt the entire night collapse around them.
They had rescued Lily.
Saved the evidence.
Found Michael.
And still the Whitmore family had reached the child again.
Daniel turned.
“I’m going back.”
The captain blocked him.
“No.”
“My uncle has my daughter.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Yes, we do.”
“We move tactically.”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“That worked wonderfully last time.”
Emma stepped between them.
“Fighting each other wastes time.”
The captain glared.
“What do you suggest?”
Emma looked at Michael.
“The original Mercer ledger.”
Michael frowned.
“What about it?”
“Richard asked for it.”
“Yes.”
“Does he know where it is?”
“No.”
Emma felt an idea forming.
“Does Daniel?”
Michael looked at Daniel.
Daniel shook his head.
Emma continued.
“Then Richard believes we can get it.”
Michael understood.
“He thinks I told you.”
“Can you create something that looks like it?”
Michael almost smiled.
“A fake?”
“Something valuable enough to trade.”
Daniel stared at Emma.
“You want to negotiate.”
“I want him focused on us instead of Lily.”
Michael nodded slowly.
“The original ledger isn’t just transaction records.”
“What is it?” Emma asked.
“Access credentials.”
Daniel frowned.
“For the offshore accounts?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
Michael looked at him.
“Last time I had complete data? About four hundred million.”
Emma whistled softly.
Daniel looked horrified.
“That money belonged to pension funds, charities, investors.”
“Which is why Richard wants access before investigators freeze everything.”
Emma nodded.
“So we offer him four hundred million dollars.”
The captain stared.
“You cannot actually give it to him.”
“No.”
Emma looked at Michael.
“But he doesn’t know that.”
Michael asked for a laptop.
Agents protested.
Daniel insisted.
Within minutes, Michael was working.
For a man who had spent twelve years imprisoned, his fingers moved surprisingly fast.
Emma sat beside him.
“Can you really fake it?”
“I created the original.”
Daniel looked over his shoulder.
“Where is the real one?”
Michael smiled.
“Somewhere Victor never found.”
“Where?”
Michael looked at Emma.
“Your mother has it.”
Emma stared.
“My mom?”
“She doesn’t know.”
Michael explained.
Before the crash, he had hidden a small encrypted drive inside an old music box.
A wooden one.
Emma remembered it instantly.
It sat on her mother’s dresser.
Her parents’ wedding song played when opened.
Her mother had kept it for twelve years.
Emma almost laughed.
“Victor searched our house after you died.”
“I assumed he would.”
“So you hid evidence in Mom’s bedroom?”
“He was looking for computers and files. Not sentimental junk.”
Daniel smiled.
“I like your father.”
Emma looked at him.
“Get in line.”
Michael built a fake ledger package.
It contained believable account lists and access screens.
Enough to fool Richard for a few minutes.
“Once he plugs this into a network, it sends his location.”
The captain nodded.
“Good.”
Daniel looked at the time.
2:17 a.m.
Richard’s deadline was sunrise.
Emma’s phone rang.
Unknown number.
Everyone froze.
Daniel answered on speaker.
Richard’s voice.
“Daniel.”
“Where is Lily?”
“She’s safe.”
“I want proof.”
A pause.
Then Lily’s voice.
“Daddy?”
Daniel nearly broke.
“Peanut.”
“I’m okay.”
“Did they hurt you?”
“No.”
Someone moved near her.
Lily whispered quickly.
“Uncle Richard says—”
The phone shifted.
Richard returned.
“You’ve heard enough.”
Daniel’s eyes burned.
“If you touch her—”
“You inherited your father’s temper.”
“You killed my father too?”
Richard chuckled.
“No. Cancer managed that without assistance.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“At least one death in this family was real, then.”
Richard ignored him.
“You have the ledger?”
“Yes.”
Emma looked at Michael.
He nodded.
Richard continued.
“And the encryption key?”
Daniel looked toward Emma.
Lily had hidden it in her sock earlier.
After the rescue, Daniel had kept it.
“Yes.”
“Bring both.”
“Where?”
“The mansion.”
Daniel frowned.
“You’re still there?”
“I’m sentimental.”
“You’re stupid.”
“Perhaps.”
Richard’s tone hardened.
“Come alone.”
“No.”
“Then Lily dies.”
Daniel’s face went white.
Richard continued calmly.
“You have until three-thirty.”
The call ended.
The captain immediately began planning.
Tactical teams.
Snipers.
Drones.
Daniel shook his head.
“Richard knows every inch of that property.”
“So do you.”
“He knows the hidden passages better than anyone. His father built them.”
Emma remembered the walls.
The narrow staircases.
The secret rooms.
“He could disappear.”
Michael spoke from the bed.
“Then don’t attack the mansion.”
Everyone looked at him.
“Make Richard leave it.”
“How?” Emma asked.
Michael looked at the fake ledger.
“Tell him you don’t trust the house.”
Daniel called Richard back.
No answer.
A text arrived.
NO CHANGES.
Emma took Daniel’s phone.
She typed.
LILY FOR LEDGER. PUBLIC LOCATION. OR I DESTROY THE KEY.
Daniel stared at her.
“That’s my daughter.”
“That’s why he’ll believe you’re desperate.”
Three dots appeared.
Then vanished.
Appeared again.
Richard replied.
WHERE?
Emma looked at Daniel.
He understood.
They chose the old Whitmore corporate headquarters.
A thirty-story office building downtown.
Closed overnight.
Daniel knew every entrance.
Police could surround it discreetly.
Most importantly, Richard would think Daniel chose it because it was familiar.
3:05 a.m.
The lobby was dark when Daniel entered alone.
At least, he appeared alone.
Emma was hidden in a service corridor with Brooks, who had finally been found unconscious in the abandoned escort vehicle.
He had insisted on coming despite a head injury.
“You should be in a hospital,” Emma whispered.
“So should half our group.”
Fair.
Tactical agents waited on nearby floors.
Michael monitored the tracking system remotely.
Daniel carried the fake ledger in one pocket.
Encryption key in another.
An elevator descended.
Doors opened.
Evelyn stepped out first.
Lily beside her.
Richard followed.
Daniel saw his daughter.
Every plan disappeared from his face for one second.
“Lily.”
“Daddy!”
Evelyn tightened her grip on the child.
Richard lifted one hand.
“Business first.”
Daniel held up the drive.
“Let her go.”
“Ledger.”
“Lily.”
Richard smiled.
“You were always terrible at negotiation.”
Daniel’s hand moved toward the encryption key.
“I break this, the ledger is worthless.”
Richard’s smile vanished.
“Don’t.”
“Send Lily to me.”
Evelyn looked at Richard.
He nodded.
She shoved Lily forward.
The child ran.
Daniel caught her.
He immediately pushed her behind him.
“Go to the elevators.”
“No.”
“Lily.”
“I’m not leaving you again.”
Evelyn rolled her eyes.
“How touching.”
Daniel looked at her.
“You tied a nine-year-old inside a wall.”
Evelyn shrugged.
“She kept screaming.”
Daniel nearly lunged.
Richard interrupted.
“The ledger.”
Daniel tossed the fake drive across the marble floor.
Richard picked it up.
“Key.”
“Verify the ledger first.”
Richard looked at Evelyn.
She pulled out a laptop.
Emma frowned.
They had prepared.
Richard inserted the drive.
The fake program opened.
Account lists appeared.
Michael’s trap was working.
Emma checked the device in her hand.
LOCATION SIGNAL ACTIVE.
The police had confirmation.
Daniel said, “Now we’re done.”
Richard typed several commands.
His expression changed.
Emma’s heart stopped.
He looked at Daniel.
“This isn’t the ledger.”
Daniel remained still.
Richard smiled coldly.
“Michael is alive.”
Daniel’s eyes betrayed him.
That was enough.
Richard laughed.
“Remarkable.”
Evelyn pulled a gun.
Brooks whispered, “We move now.”
Emma nodded.
Before they could, steel shutters dropped over the lobby windows.
Lights went out.
Gunfire erupted.
Lily screamed.
Emma ran.
Emergency lights flickered red.
Agents shouted from stairwells.
But the security shutters had divided the lobby.
Richard grabbed Lily.
Daniel tackled him.
Evelyn fired.
The bullet hit marble.
Brooks fired back.
Evelyn disappeared behind a column.
Emma reached Daniel.
Richard kicked him away.
Lily bit Richard’s hand.
He shouted.
She ran toward Emma.
Emma grabbed her.
“Got you!”
Then Evelyn stepped from the darkness.
Gun aimed directly at them.
“Give her to me.”
Emma moved Lily behind her.
“No.”
Evelyn laughed.
“You’re a waitress.”
Emma almost smiled.
“And somehow I’m still ruining your night.”
Evelyn’s finger tightened on the trigger.
A gunshot exploded.
Emma flinched.
But she wasn’t hit.
Evelyn stared down.
Blood spread across her sleeve.
Brooks stood twenty feet away, gun raised.
“Drop it.”
Evelyn screamed and fired toward him.
Brooks ducked.
Emma pulled Lily behind a desk.
Daniel fought Richard near the elevators.
The older man was stronger than he looked.
Richard slammed Daniel against the wall.
“You destroyed your own family.”
Daniel punched him.
“You did that decades ago.”
Richard hit him back.
“I built this family!”
“You stole from it!”
“I saved it!”
Another gunshot.
Evelyn ran toward a service hallway.
Brooks followed.
Emma stayed with Lily.
Then she heard Daniel shout.
Richard had a knife.
He drove Daniel backward.
Lily screamed.
“Daddy!”
Daniel caught Richard’s wrist.
They struggled.
The blade moved closer to Daniel’s chest.
Emma looked around.
Fire extinguisher.
Again.
She grabbed it.
Ran.
And slammed it into Richard’s shoulder.
The knife fell.
Daniel punched his uncle to the floor.
Agents finally breached the shutter.
“Hands!”
“Don’t move!”
Richard looked up.
For the first time all night, the calm disappeared.
He was afraid.
Daniel stood over him.
“You kept me from my daughter for three years.”
Richard smiled weakly.
“You think I was the one who chose that?”
Daniel froze.
“What?”
Richard’s smile returned.
“You still don’t understand your own wife.”
Daniel stared.
Richard whispered.
“Evelyn didn’t work for me.”
A scream came from the service hallway.
Brooks.
Emma turned.
Then silence.
Daniel grabbed Richard.
“Who did she work for?”
Richard laughed.
“Herself.”
Daniel shook him.
“What does that mean?”
Richard looked toward the hallway where Evelyn had vanished.
“It means Victor and I thought we were using Evelyn.”
His smile widened.
“But she was stealing from all of us.”
Emma felt dread.
“How much?”
Richard looked at her.
“Everything.”
Then the building alarm began screaming.
Michael’s voice came through Emma’s earpiece.
“Get out!”
She touched it.
“What?”
“The fake ledger just triggered another program.”
Emma stared.
“I didn’t put it there,” Michael said.
Daniel looked toward Richard.
Richard looked genuinely confused.
Michael shouted through the earpiece.
“Someone is transferring the Hale accounts right now.”
Daniel whispered, “Evelyn.”
Richard’s face went white.
May you like
Hundreds of millions of stolen dollars were disappearing.
And Evelyn was gone.
