Chapter 7
Melissa did not know about the video.
At least, that was what she told police.
I watched it once.
That was enough.
The camera angle was low.
Probably recorded accidentally or intentionally by the burner phone.
Marcus crouched near my SUV.
Melissa stood several feet away.
Her arms were folded.
“I don’t like this,” she said.
Marcus didn’t look at her.
“You wanted leverage.”
“I wanted Daniel to stop treating me like a child.”
“Then stop acting scared.”
“What exactly are you doing?”
“Enough to make him nervous.”
“Marcus.”
He stood.
“Relax.”
“What if he crashes?”
“He won’t.”
Melissa looked toward the garage entrance.
“Promise me.”
Marcus smiled.
“Nothing is going to happen to your husband.”
Three days later, I nearly died.
When the video ended, I stared at the blank screen.
Detective Ramirez sat across from me.
“That significantly strengthens the case.”
“Why was it in Emma’s toy box?”
“We don’t know.”
“Who sent the message telling me to look?”
“We don’t know that either.”
I laughed bitterly.
“That’s becoming a popular answer.”
Ramirez didn’t react.
“Someone wanted you to find it.”
“Marcus?”
“Why would he give you evidence against himself?”
“Melissa?”
“She says no.”
“Do you believe her?”
“I don’t make decisions based on belief.”
That answer irritated me.
It was also why I trusted him.
Evidence.
Facts.
Proof.
For months I had none.
Now I wanted everything nailed down.
The burner phone revealed more.
Marcus had used encrypted apps.
Some messages were deleted.
Technical investigators recovered fragments.
Payments to a private nurse who never officially worked for me.
Orders for medical supplies.
Research about legal incapacity.
Questions about how long sedatives remained detectable in blood.
And photographs.
Dozens of photographs of me.
Sleeping.
Eating.
Sitting in the wheelchair.
Signing papers.
At first, they looked like ordinary family pictures.
Then I understood.
They were documentation.
Marcus and Melissa were building a story.
A record showing a dependent, confused man.
One photograph showed me holding a pen over a contract.
I remembered that day.
Or pieces of it.
Melissa brought me soup.
I woke later with documents beside the bed.
She told me I had signed routine insurance forms.
The photograph made it look like I was willingly signing business papers.
My hand began shaking.
Rachel closed the laptop.
“Enough.”
“No.”
“Daniel.”
“I need to know.”
“You don’t need to destroy yourself.”
“I need to know what happened.”
Rachel stared at me.
Then reopened the laptop.
We kept going.
One audio recording changed everything.
It was Marcus speaking to someone named Victor.
“You only needed to scare him.”
Victor answered, “I did what you paid me to do.”
“He almost died.”
“That’s not my problem.”
“You cut too deep.”
“You said disable the brakes.”
“I said create a leak.”
“Same result.”
I looked at Ramirez.
“Victor?”
“We believe he may be Victor Lane. Former mechanic. Prior fraud conviction.”
“Where is he?”
“Unknown.”
Marcus wasn’t alone.
Not from the beginning.
The stranger at Emma’s school might have been Victor.
Police compared the school camera image with an old driver’s license photo.
Match.
Now there were two men being hunted.
Marcus.
Victor.
I stopped taking Emma to school.
A tutor came to Rachel’s apartment instead.
Emma complained.
“I miss Lily.”
“I know.”
“I miss recess.”
“I know.”
“Is it because of the bad man?”
I hated that phrase.
Bad man.
Children should worry about monsters under beds.
Not real ones standing outside schools.
“Just for a little while.”
She crossed her arms.
“You always say that.”
I stared at her.
“What?”
“Mommy used to say that.”
The words hit me.
“What did she say?”
“Daddy needs to sleep just for a little while.”
Emma looked at me.
“Then you slept all day.”
I crouched.
“I’m not going to do that anymore.”
“You promise?”
“Yes.”
She held out her pinky.
I hooked mine around it.
“Promise.”
That night, I woke at 2:13 a.m.
For seven months, waking in the night meant fear.
Would Melissa hear me moving?
Would my legs work?
Had she changed my pills again?
Now I was safe.
But my body didn’t know that.
I walked into the kitchen.
Rachel was already there.
“Can’t sleep?”
“No.”
“Me neither.”
She poured coffee.
I shook my head.
“Tea.”
“You’re becoming boring.”
“I almost got poisoned to death.”
“Fine. Tea.”
We sat in silence.
Then Rachel said, “I got an email.”
“From who?”
“Melissa.”
I looked up.
“When?”
“An hour ago.”
“She’s not supposed to contact Emma.”
“She contacted me.”
“What did she say?”
Rachel turned her laptop.
The email was short.
Rachel,
I know Daniel hates me. He has every right.
But Marcus will not stop until he gets the burner phone or knows everything on it has been copied.
The phone did not belong to me.
It belonged to Victor.
I found it in Marcus’s coat after the accident. I hid it because I was afraid.
If Victor knows Daniel has it, Emma is in danger.
There is one place Marcus may go.
The cabin near Lake Wenatchee.
Daniel will know which one.
Please tell police.
I stared at the screen.
I did know.
Marcus and I had bought a fishing cabin together eight years earlier.
We used it twice.
Then life got busy.
I had forgotten it existed.
The title was held through a small recreational LLC.
Marcus probably thought nobody would connect him to it quickly.
I called Ramirez.
Police moved fast.
State patrol.
County deputies.
A tactical unit.
Nobody allowed me near the cabin.
For once, I didn’t argue.
Emma needed me more than my anger needed revenge.
At 6:40 the next morning, Ramirez called.
“We found someone.”
“Marcus?”
“No.”
“Victor?”
“Yes.”
My pulse jumped.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Marcus?”
“Gone.”
Victor had been hiding at the cabin.
He surrendered after a brief standoff.
Inside, police found cash.
Fake identification.
Two handguns.
Medication.
And a notebook containing dates.
My accident date.
Several injection dates.
Company meetings.
Court dates.
Emma’s school address.
I sat down when Ramirez told me.
“What was he planning at the school?”
“He hasn’t answered.”
I looked through the window.
Emma was in the living room building a tower with blocks.
“What does he want?”
“His attorney.”
“Of course.”
Victor started cooperating twelve hours later.
He wanted a deal.
His version of the story was ugly.
Marcus paid him to damage my brakes.
After the crash, Marcus blamed Victor for making the damage too severe.
Then Marcus paid him to stay quiet.
Months later, when I started recovering, Marcus asked Victor to watch the house.
Then the company.
Then Emma’s school.
“What was he supposed to do to Emma?” I asked.
Ramirez hesitated.
“Daniel.”
“Tell me.”
“He says he was supposed to photograph her.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s what he says.”
“Do you believe him?”
“I told you. Evidence.”
I clenched my jaw.
“Was there evidence of anything worse?”
“Not currently.”
Currently.
I hated that word.
Victor also told police Marcus had somewhere else to go.
A rented apartment in Bellevue.
Officers raided it.
Empty.
Still warm.
Coffee on the counter.
A laptop charger plugged into the wall.
Marcus had been there hours earlier.
On the kitchen table was an envelope.
My name was written on it.
Inside was a photograph of Marcus and me from fifteen years ago.
College graduation.
We were twenty-two.
Smiling.
Arms around each other.
On the back, Marcus had written:
You were supposed to bring me with you.
I stared at the sentence.
Then I understood something I had missed.
This was never only about money.
Marcus hated me.
Maybe he had hated me for years.
I called Helen.
“I want everything.”
“What?”
“Every old contract. Every founder agreement. Every equity change. Every email between Marcus and the board.”
“Why?”
“Because he thinks I stole something from him.”
Rachel overheard.
“What?”
I showed her the photograph.
She read the message.
Then her face changed.
“Daniel.”
“What?”
“Do you remember when Dad invested in the company?”
“Of course.”
Our father had put in money during our first year.
Without him, Hale-Bennett Technologies might have died before it started.
Rachel looked uneasy.
“Dad told me something before he died.”
My pulse slowed.
“What?”
“He said Marcus believed the company was supposed to be fifty-fifty.”
“It was never fifty-fifty.”
“I know.”
“Dad’s investment diluted both of us.”
“Not equally.”
I stared at her.
“What are you talking about?”
Rachel swallowed.
“Dad bought some of Marcus’s shares.”
I froze.
“No.”
“He did.”
“Why?”
“Marcus needed money.”
“He never told me.”
“Dad told Marcus not to.”
I stood.
“So Marcus sold shares voluntarily, then blamed me?”
Rachel shook her head.
“It may be worse.”
“What?”
“Dad said Marcus asked to buy them back two years later.”
“And?”
“Dad refused.”
My chest tightened.
“Why?”
“Because by then he didn’t trust Marcus.”
The room went quiet.
“What did Dad know?”
Rachel looked at me.
“I don’t know.”
That night, we opened Dad’s old storage files.
Boxes we had not touched since his death.
Tax records.
Contracts.
Letters.
Photographs.
Then Rachel found an envelope labeled DANIEL — PRIVATE.
Inside was a copy of an old background investigation.
Commissioned by my father.
Subject: Marcus Hale.
There were gambling debts.
Hidden loans.
Threatening messages to an ex-business partner.
And at the bottom, a handwritten note from Dad.
Daniel trusts him completely.
I don’t.
If anything happens to me before I can explain this, protect Daniel from Marcus.
My hands went numb.
Dad had died four years ago.
Heart attack.
Natural causes.
At least, that was what we had always believed.
Rachel stared at me.
I stared back.
May you like
Neither of us said the thought out loud.
We didn’t have to.
