I SPENT 3 YEARS IN PRISON FOR A CRIME I NEVER COMMITTED. WHEN I RETURNED HOME, MY STEPMOTHER SAID MY FATHER WAS DEAD AND THREW ME OUT. THEN A CEMETERY GUARD REVEALED THE SECRET MY FATHER HAD LEFT BEHIND…

We left the main highway, passed a deserted gas station, and followed a narrow road lined with dead trees. At its end stood an abandoned greenhouse, its windows cracked and its iron gate covered in rust.

“What is this place?” I asked.

“Silas used to grow roses here before he became a cemetery groundskeeper.”

She took a small key from beneath the dashboard and unlocked the gate.

Inside, broken flowerpots lay scattered across the concrete floor. Dead vines climbed the walls, and rainwater dripped through holes in the glass roof.

A faint scraping sound came from the back room.

I grabbed a length of pipe from the floor.

“Who's there?”

“Put that down before you hurt yourself.”

I froze.

Silas stepped into the light.

His right shoulder was wrapped in bloodstained bandages, and his face had gone gray with pain. But he was alive.

“You're supposed to be dead,” I said.

“Apparently, I'm becoming very difficult to kill.”

I nearly dropped the pipe.

“Who shot you?”

“Reed. He came into the chapel while I was putting the box away. He wanted the key, but I refused to give it to him.”

“Why didn't he finish you?”

“He thought he had.”

Silas sank into an old chair. Evelyn hurried over to examine his wound.

“The bullet passed through my shoulder,” he explained. “After he left, I crawled through the drainage channel behind the chapel. A man driving past found me and brought me here.”

“Why didn't you go to the police?”

Silas gave me a tired look.

“Which police officer would you suggest I trust?”

I had no answer.

He reached beneath his chair and pulled out a brown leather notebook.

“Your father started investigating the company's missing money before you were arrested. He discovered that Reagan and Carter were moving assets into a holding company called Northstar Meridian. But someone else was funding the operation.”

“Who?”

Silas opened the notebook to a page covered in handwritten names.

The final entry had been circled three times.

JULIAN CROSS.

“Who is he?”

“The man in the photograph your father gave me. He's the chairman of the investment group preparing to buy Dennis Enterprises.”

Evelyn stiffened.

“Cross has connections to several private medical facilities. If he's funding the fraud, he could be paying for Camden's treatment as well.”

“Treatment?” I asked. “They're drugging Dad to make him sign papers.”

Silas nodded.

“Camden told me that if something happened to him, I should give you the key and the recorder. He said you'd understand once you found the original documents.”

“What documents?”

“The ones proving who truly owns Dennis Enterprises.”

He turned another page.

There was a photograph of a building surrounded by pine trees, with the word BELLWEATHER printed beneath it.

On the back, Dad had written a list of room numbers.

Most were crossed out.

One remained.

17.

I removed the rusted key from my pocket.

Silas stared at it.

“Your father didn't just give me that key,” he said. “He gave me instructions. It's supposed to open a door inside Bellweather, but not the door you're thinking of.”

“What door, then?”

“The old records room. Your father's medical files, the original will, and evidence against everyone involved were hidden there before the facility was taken over.”

Evelyn studied the photograph.

“If those records still exist, they could prove the death was falsified and expose the fraud.”

“Then we get them,” I said.

Silas grabbed my wrist.

“Listen to me. There is one more thing your father wanted you to know.”

His voice dropped.

“Reagan isn't the person who ordered your arrest.”

I stared at him.

“Then who did?”

Silas looked toward the greenhouse entrance, where headlights had appeared through the broken glass.

“I never learned his real name.”

The lights stopped outside.