Chapter 11 - THIRTY MINUTESThe police wanted me to stay put.
I refused.
“I know where the ledger is.”
Everyone looked at me.
I reached into my coat.
I had kept a photocopy.
Not the original.
The kidnappers didn't know that.
“We give them this,” I said.
Detective Alvarez stared at me.
“You're going to lie to kidnappers?”
“They lied to me for nine years.”
She almost smiled.
Then the smile disappeared.
“We need a plan.”
I had thirty minutes.
The location they gave me was an abandoned train station outside the city.
I recognized it.
Daniel had taken me there once.
He said it was part of an old business property.
Another lie.
We arrived ten minutes early.
The station was empty.
My hands shook.
Detective Alvarez and her team surrounded the area.
I walked inside alone.
“Marian.”
Daniel's voice echoed through the station.
He stepped into the light.
No gun.
No panic.
Just that same calm expression.
And beside him stood Richard Voss.
My stomach turned.
Voss looked at me like I was an inconvenience.
“You look like your father.”
“So I've been told.”
He smiled.
“Your father was stubborn.”
“He was smarter than you.”
The smile disappeared.
“Where is the ledger?”
I held up the copy.
“Give me Lily.”
Voss nodded.
A woman appeared behind him.
She was holding my daughter.
Vanessa.
Her face was bruised again.
But she was alive.
Lily was crying.
I almost ran toward her.
“Stay there.”
Voss raised one hand.
“Give us the ledger.”
I held it up.
“First Lily.”
Daniel stepped forward.
“Marian.”
He sounded almost pleading.
“You don't understand what happens if this gets out.”
“People go to prison?”
“People die.”
“That isn't my problem.”
“It will be.”
Voss took the copy.
He flipped through the pages.
Then he laughed.
“This isn't the original.”
My heart stopped.
He looked directly at me.
“You think I didn't know your father made copies?”
Daniel turned toward him.
“You said she wouldn't have it.”
“I said she wouldn't know she had it.”
Voss smiled.
“But she figured it out.”
He reached into his coat.
Pulled out a gun.
And shot Daniel.
I screamed.
Daniel collapsed.
Voss grabbed Vanessa.
“Now you understand who is in control.”
He raised the gun again.
But before he could fire, Detective Alvarez shouted:
“DROP IT!”
Police flooded the station.
Gunfire erupted.
Vanessa ran.
Voss disappeared into a tunnel.
I reached Lily.
She was safe.
Alive.
I held her so tightly she cried.
Then I looked at Daniel.
Blood was spreading across his shirt.
He was still alive.
He looked at me.
His lips moved.
I knelt.
“What?”
He whispered:
“The real ledger…”
I leaned closer.
“Where?”
He smiled weakly.
“Your father's grave.”
Then he closed his eyes.
The ambulance arrived.
And as Daniel was carried away, Detective Alvarez pulled me aside.
“We found something in Voss's car.”
“What?”
“A list.”
“Of what?”
She looked at me.
“Everyone they planned to eliminate.”
My name was number one.
Daniel's was number two.
Vanessa's was number three.
Then I saw the fourth name.
I knew it.
It belonged to someone I trusted.
Someone I had never suspected.
Detective Alvarez said:
May you like
“Your father's attorney is missing.”
Edward Hale.
