Chapter 10 - THE MURDER INSIDE THE FAMILY
Addison left the room.
Dwayne followed.
She reached the private elevator.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Follow me.”
He stopped.
Good.
She pressed the button.
Then turned.
“My father died in a car accident.”
“Apparently not.”
“Stop.”
Her voice cracked.
Dwayne said nothing.
The elevator opened.
She did not enter.
Instead she asked:
“Do you believe Elias?”
“I believe he thinks he killed Samuel.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.”
She looked at him.
For once, he understood what she needed.
Not answers.
No promises.
Space without abandonment.
“I’ll be inside.”
He returned to the office.
Addison came back ten minutes later.
Eyes dry.
Posture straight.
Armor back on.
“Call him.”
Dwayne did.
Elias answered.
Addison spoke first.
“Why?”
Silence.
“Samuel’s daughter?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you kill my father?”
“I didn’t intend to.”
Her hand tightened.
“Everyone says that after someone dies.”
Elias exhaled.
Twenty-nine years earlier, Samuel discovered Vincent Cross was planning to steal baby Daniel—Dwayne—from Margaret.
Samuel tried to intervene.
Elias and Samuel fought.
Vehicle.
Rain.
Samuel fell from a bridge.
Elias believed he died.
“Believed?”
Addison stared.
“My father lived until I was twelve.”
Silence.
Elias said:
“What?”
There it was.
Another false assumption.
Samuel survived.
Changed his name.
Raised Addison.
Never told Elias.
Dwayne almost laughed.
Nobody in this family could die correctly.
Addison asked:
“So you didn’t kill him.”
“I thought I did for seventeen years.”
“Why did he never tell you?”
“I don’t know.”
Nathan spoke from across the room.
“I might.”
Everyone turned.
Nathan had accessed their mother’s old storage records.
One letter from Samuel.
Never mailed.
Elias,
I survived. I’m not coming back. You chose power over blood once. I won’t give you a second chance to do it to my daughter.
Addison read it.
Her face crumpled.
Her father had kept her away deliberately.
Not from shame.
From fear.
Then Nathan found the death certificate.
Samuel Lynwood died when Addison was twelve.
Actual cause:
Pancreatic cancer.
No crime.
No hidden murder.
For once.
Addison laughed through tears.
“Cancer.”
Dwayne nodded.
“Almost disappointingly ordinary.”
She looked at him.
Then laughed harder.
Wrong reaction.
Right moment.
But Elias had another problem.
Federal agents were actively hunting him.
Simon had planted evidence.
Dwayne could expose Simon by turning over Cross internal accounts.
Doing so would reveal years of Dwayne’s own crimes.
Addison understood immediately.
“If you give them everything, they investigate you too.”
“Yes.”
“Prison?”
“Possible.”
“How long?”
“Depends.”
She stared.
Dwayne had spent his life choosing control.
This was the opposite.
He picked up the phone.
Called his attorney.
“Set up a meeting with the U.S. Attorney.”
Addison’s expression changed.
“You’re doing it?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Simon disappears people under my company name.”
He looked at her.
“And I’m tired of pretending that isn’t my responsibility.”
Before she could answer, the office lights went out.
Emergency power failed too.
Dwayne’s security chief shouted from the hallway.
Then gunfire erupted downstairs.
May you like
Simon had not run to safety.
He had come back to Cross Logistics.
