Chapter 8 - THE LEDGER WAS HIDDEN IN CASSIE’S HOUSE
Walter denied it for exactly eleven seconds.
Then he started crying.
We were back in his hospital room.
Cassie stood near the window, arms folded.
“Where is it?”
Walter whispered, “Home.”
Her face changed.
“You kept evidence from a murder in our house?”
“Not exactly.”
“That is not comforting.”
He explained.
Vincent gave him a paper ledger and a microcassette recording.
Walter hid both inside an old refrigeration compressor housing.
The unit had moved with the family from apartment to apartment because Cassie’s mother used it as an end table after Walter cleaned and painted it.
Cassie stared.
“The blue metal table in the living room?”
“Yes.”
“You put murder evidence inside Mom’s furniture?”
“It wasn’t furniture when I hid it.”
“That is your defense?”
Despite everything, I nearly smiled.
Cassie saw.
“Don’t.”
I stopped.
Marco sent a team.
Not my men alone.
Police accompanied them.
The compressor housing was gone.
Cassie went pale.
“It was there yesterday.”
“Who has a key?” I asked.
“Me. Dad. Building superintendent.”
“And?”
She thought.
“Gordon.”
I stared.
“Why does Gordon have a key to your apartment?”
“My dad had a cardiac episode last year. Gordon said someone nearby should have emergency access.”
Walter closed his eyes.
“He planned that.”
Of course he did.
Security footage showed Gordon entering Cassie’s building two hours after Walter collapsed.
He carried nothing inside.
He left carrying a toolbox.
The ledger was probably in it.
Police tracked Gordon’s vehicle through toll cameras.
New Jersey.
Heading toward one of Bellacort’s oldest warehouses.
The same facility linked to the eighteen-year-old freezer scandal.
I knew the building.
It had been scheduled for demolition in two weeks.
Too convenient.
We arrived with federal agents.
Cassie insisted on coming.
I objected.
She ignored me.
Fair.
The warehouse was dark except for emergency lighting.
Gordon’s car sat outside.
Inside, officers found the compressor housing smashed open.
Ledger gone.
Microcassette gone.
Gordon was upstairs in the control room.
Alive.
Bleeding from the head.
He had been attacked.
Before paramedics took him, he grabbed my sleeve.
“Rachel lied.”
“She already admitted involvement.”
“No.”
His eyes were unfocused.
“She didn’t build this.”
“Who did?”
Gordon coughed.
“Thomas.”
My uncle.
I leaned closer.
“Where is the ledger?”
Gordon looked terrified.
“He took it.”
“When?”
“Ten minutes before you came.”
Marco swore.
Thomas had escaped through a loading tunnel.
Then Gordon grabbed Cassie’s wrist.
She flinched.
I nearly moved.
She handled it herself.
“Let go.”
He did.
“Cassie,” he whispered, “your father was supposed to die last year.”
Everyone went silent.
“What?”
“The device alert.”
He looked at Walter’s daughter.
“Thomas ordered us to remove his name.”
“Why?”
Gordon’s eyes filled with fear.
“Because Walter recognized him.”
Cassie frowned.
“Recognized him from where?”
Gordon’s answer changed the entire history.
“Thomas Bellacort was at the warehouse the night six patients lost their medication.”
He swallowed.
May you like
“He wasn’t covering up the failure.”
“He caused it.”
