Chapter 6 - THE WRONG KIDNAPPING
The hospital went into lockdown in four minutes.
Too slow.
Cameras showed Emily leaving her room at 3:26 p.m.
Walking.
Not dragged.
A nurse pushed her wheelchair toward the service elevator.
Except the woman wasn’t a nurse.
Her badge belonged to an employee who had called in sick.
Emily looked barely conscious.
The fake nurse wheeled her into an underground parking garage.
A black Mercedes van was waiting.
Gone by 3:31.
Five minutes.
That was all they needed.
Detective Chen wanted me to stay at the hospital.
I didn’t.
Marcus met me in the parking lot with two laptops and the expression of a man who had already broken three laws for a friend.
“We got a plate.”
“Real?”
“Stolen.”
“Traffic cameras?”
“Working.”
The van headed east.
Then disappeared beneath an overpass.
Marcus tapped keys.
“Wait.”
“What?”
“The phone clone moved.”
Emily’s cloned device signal had activated again.
“Where?”
He turned the laptop.
Whitmore estate.
I stared at him.
“They want us back there.”
“Obviously.”
“No.”
Something felt wrong.
Arthur had spent two decades surviving.
Men like him didn’t point directly at their hiding place.
“They want police at the estate.”
Marcus understood.
“Destroy evidence while everyone searches the wrong location.”
“Or make us find something.”
My phone rang.
Evan.
This time, I answered.
“Where is she?”
His voice was shaking.
“I didn’t take Emily.”
“I’m going to give you one chance.”
“Listen to me!”
I almost hung up.
Then he said:
“My father took her.”
“You told the world your father was dead.”
“I thought he was.”
That stopped me.
“He came back three years ago.”
“And you didn’t tell Emily?”
“He said if I did, he’d destroy us.”
“What does that mean?”
“My mother has been laundering money for him since I was a kid.”
I closed my eyes.
“You knew.”
“Not everything.”
“You held a bat on the porch while your wife was being assaulted.”
Silence.
“I was scared.”
“You were protecting yourself.”
“Yes.”
At least he finally said something true.
“Where would Arthur take her?”
“I don’t know.”
I laughed.
“Wrong answer.”
“Daniel, wait.”
A breath.
“There’s a farmhouse.”
“Where?”
“Near Culpeper. My father used it before he disappeared.”
“Address.”
“I’ll text it.”
Then Evan added:
“He isn’t doing this because of Emily.”
“I know.”
“He wants something Rebecca had.”
My blood went cold.
“What?”
“A ledger.”
I remembered Rebecca’s old cloud account.
Emily had uploaded the basement evidence there.
Maybe she had found something else.
“What ledger?”
“I only heard them talk about it.”
“Who?”
“My parents.”
“Margaret knows?”
“She knows everything.”
“Where is she?”
Another silence.
“Evan.”
“She’s with my father.”
He sounded like a little boy.
Then he whispered:
“Daniel… they’re not taking Emily to hurt her.”
“What are they doing?”
“They’re using her to make you open Rebecca’s files.”
Marcus looked at me.
I knew what he was thinking.
We needed the cloud account.
Now.
Before Arthur did.
Then Evan said something that made every hair on my arms rise.
“Whatever you do, don’t use the password Emily remembers.”
“Why?”
“Because my father knows it too.”
The call ended.
Marcus stared at me.
“How would Arthur know your wife’s password?”
I looked at Rebecca’s photograph.
Then at the old informant memorandum.
And for the first time, I considered the possibility that the betrayal inside my marriage had gone deeper than secrets.
May you like
Maybe Rebecca hadn’t simply infiltrated Arthur’s world.
Maybe Arthur had once been inside hers.
