Chapter 6 - THE SISTER WHO FINALLY CALLED ME FIRST
Claire had spent our entire childhood making sure I arrived second.
Second to be believed.
Second to be comforted.
Second to be forgiven.
Now, for the first time in our lives, she had called me first because she was afraid.
I hated that it mattered.
Police found her apartment empty.
No forced entry.
No blood.
No Claire.
Her purse remained on the couch.
Her car remained downstairs.
The copy of the agreement was gone.
My mother called me twenty-seven times.
I answered the twenty-eighth.
“This is your fault.”
There it was.
Old habits survived kidnapping.
“My fault?”
“You pushed her.”
“I didn’t send men to her apartment.”
“If you had just signed the document when your father asked—”
I laughed.
She stopped.
“Mom, do you even hear yourself?”
“My daughter is missing.”
“I am also your daughter.”
Silence.
Two years earlier, that sentence would have hurt.
Now it just sounded like evidence.
Ethan walked into the kitchen carrying two coffees.
He could tell from my face who I was talking to.
My mother continued.
“You always have to be right.”
“No. I just stopped volunteering to be wrong.”
She began crying.
I lowered the phone.
“Call me when you want to discuss facts.”
“Don’t you hang up on me.”
I hung up.
At noon, Dad arrived at our house without warning.
Ethan opened the door but did not let him inside.
I stood behind him.
Dad looked exhausted.
“Claire is gone.”
“I know.”
“We need to work together.”
The audacity nearly impressed me.
“For two years, you told relatives I was unstable.”
“This is not the time.”
“You skipped my graduation.”
“Not the time.”
“You insulted my husband.”
Ethan raised one eyebrow.
Dad looked away.
I stepped closer.
“Actually, this is exactly the time. Because you want cooperation from someone you spent years discrediting.”
His face tightened.
“What do you want?”
“Truth.”
“I’ve told you everything.”
“No.”
I showed him Grandpa’s Blackridge II letter.
Dad’s face changed.
“You knew about this?”
“I do now.”
He read the Missouri property line.
Then sat down on our front step without being invited.
“Oh God.”
“What?”
He rubbed both hands over his face.
“What is at the Missouri facility?”
“Records.”
“What records?”
“I don’t know.”
“You do.”
Dad looked at me.
For the first time, he looked afraid rather than angry.
“Your grandfather kept original ledgers.”
“What ledgers?”
“Blackridge’s earliest government contracts.”
“Why hide them?”
“Because some were illegal.”
My stomach dropped.
“What kind of illegal?”
Dad shook his head.
“I don’t know details.”
“Dad.”
“I was a kid when it happened.”
“You weren’t a kid in 1994.”
He stopped.
“That land was purchased in 1994.”
He stared at me.
I continued.
“You were thirty-six.”
He looked away.
“Claire’s agreement gave Julian access.”
“Yes.”
“So someone wants records from that building.”
“Yes.”
“Why now?”
Dad whispered:
“Because Blackridge is about to be audited.”
I froze.
“What audit?”
“Federal infrastructure compliance.”
“When?”
“Next month.”
“And you didn’t think to mention this?”
“I didn’t think it was connected.”
I laughed.
“Everything is connected.”
His phone buzzed.
A message.
He read it.
His face went gray.
He handed me the screen.
A photograph.
Claire sitting in a chair.
Not tied.
Not injured.
Julian Cross stood behind her.
Older.
Silver-haired.
Scar near his chin.
Exactly as she had described.
Across the bottom:
COME TO MISSOURI.
BRING THE PROTECTOR.
I stared at the words.
Dad whispered:
“That means you.”
Then another message arrived.
DON’T BRING ROBERT.
HE ALREADY KNOWS WHY HENRY BURIED THE BODIES.
May you like
I looked slowly at my father.
He did not deny it.
