Chapter 5 - Pier 47Seattle at midnight always felt like a city holding its breath.
Rain coated the pavement.
The harbor lights flickered across the water.
I walked toward Pier 47 alone.
Every instinct told me to turn around.
But four years of grief had just been replaced by one impossible possibility.
My father might be alive.
A figure stood at the end of the pier.
Gray suit.
Silver hair.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“Dad?”
The man turned.
It was him.
There was no question.
He looked older.
Thinner.
But it was my father.
His eyes filled with tears.
“Claire.”
My knees nearly buckled.
I wanted to run to him.
I wanted to hit him.
Instead, I whispered:
“You're alive.”
“I am.”
“You let me bury you.”
“I had to.”
“You let me think you were dead.”
“I was protecting you.”
“You were protecting yourself.”
He flinched.
I stepped closer.
“Why?”
“Because they were watching you.”
“Who?”
He looked toward the water.
“The same people who killed your mother.”
My breath caught.
“My mother died of cancer.”
“No.”
The world seemed to stop.
“No?”
“It was made to look natural.”
I shook my head.
“You’re lying.”
“I wish I were.”
He reached into his coat and pulled out a photograph.
My mother stood beside a younger Ethan.
Beside them were two other men.
My father.
And Ethan's father.
Behind the photograph was a handwritten date.
June 14.
The date of my mother's death.
“Your mother discovered the accounts,” my father said.
“She was going to expose them.”
“And they killed her?”
“She had been poisoned slowly.”
I couldn't speak.
Then I noticed something.
My father's eyes kept moving toward the road.
“They're coming.”
“Who?”
He grabbed my arm.
“Listen carefully. The compass is a key.”
“To what?”
“The account ledger.”
“What ledger?”
“The money.”
He looked terrified.
“Thirty-two million isn't missing.”
“What?”
“It was moved.”
“Where?”
“Into an account in your name.”
I stared at him.
“Mine?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because they needed a clean identity.”
I suddenly remembered something.
The bank account my father opened for me when I was nineteen.
The one he told me never to close.
The one I had barely used.
“It's still active.”
He nodded.
“They've been using you for years.”
I felt dizzy.
“Then Ethan knows.”
“He knows some of it.”
“And Vanessa?”
My father looked away.
“Vanessa is not the woman you think she is.”
Before I could ask what that meant, headlights appeared at the far end of the pier.
Three cars.
My father shoved something into my hand.
A tiny metal key.
“Go.”
“No.”
“Claire, go!”
“What about you?”
“I've done this before.”
“I'm not leaving you again.”
He smiled sadly.
“You already did.”
A gunshot cracked through the night.
My father pushed me down.
Another shot.
Then another.
Men rushed from the vehicles.
I crawled behind a stack of crates.
My father ran in the opposite direction.
A man shouted.
“Get the girl!”
Footsteps approached.
I held my breath.
Then a hand covered my mouth.
I nearly screamed.
A familiar voice whispered:
“It's me.”
Ethan.
I stared at him.
“You followed me.”
“Yes.”
“I told you not to.”
“I know.”
He pulled me up.
“Your father is gone.”
I looked toward the end of the pier.
“Gone where?”
Ethan shook his head.
“He didn't escape.”
“What?”
“He was shot.”
I froze.
“Where is he?”
Ethan didn't answer.
Then something heavy fell from my hand.
The little key.
It hit the wooden pier.
Ethan stared at it.
And whispered:
“That's not a key.”
I looked down.
It had a tiny engraved number.
0714.
My mother's death date.
May you like
Then Ethan said the words that shattered everything.
“That's the password to the account.”
