Chapter 4 - Someone Is Hunting MeThe room exploded into motion.

Richard shut the safe.

Margaret killed the study lights.

I crouched behind the desk.

My heart pounded so loudly I was certain the intruders could hear it.

Someone moved upstairs.

Another person entered through the rear corridor.

There were at least two of them.

Maybe three.

Richard whispered, “Do exactly what I say.”

I nodded.

He pointed toward a narrow door behind the bookcase.

“Emergency passage.”

“There's a passage?”

“Your grandfather designed the house.”

Of course he did.

We slipped through.

The hidden corridor smelled like dust and stone.

We moved in darkness.

Behind us, the study door slammed open.

A man's voice barked,

“Where is it?”

Someone else answered,

“The safe was opened.”

“They took the ledger.”

Richard's hand tightened around my shoulder.

We reached a staircase descending into darkness.

When we emerged, we were beneath the garage.

Richard opened a concealed door.

A security guard waited there.

“Get the cars ready.”

“What about the intruders?”

“Police are on the way.”

I looked back toward the house.

“Who are they?”

Richard's expression was grim.

“The wrong people.”

“That's not an answer.”

“No.”

He looked at me.

“It isn't.”

The police arrived twenty minutes later.

By then the intruders were gone.

They had entered through a basement window and disabled two exterior cameras.

But they made one mistake.

They had left footprints in the mud.

And on one of the broken windows, they left blood.

The police collected it.

Richard asked me to go upstairs.

I refused.

“I need to see the security footage.”

“We'll handle that.”

“No.”

I picked up the black ledger.

“You said my grandfather left me the truth.”

Richard looked at the ledger.

“Yes.”

“Then I'm going to learn it.”

We entered the security room.

One monitor still worked.

Richard pulled up archived footage.

We watched the intruders approach.

Black clothing.

Masks.

Gloves.

Professional.

Then the camera switched angles.

And I saw someone I recognized.

The back of the person's head.

The way he walked.

The slight limp in his right leg.

I had seen it every day growing up.

“No.”

Richard paused the video.

I stared at the screen.

“That can't be him.”

“Who?”

“My father's driver.”

Richard rewound.

The man appeared again.

Same gait.

Same limp.

I remembered seeing him at our house.

At Christmas.

At birthdays.

Outside my school.

Always nearby.

Always invisible.

“He was watching me.”

Richard didn't answer.

I stood.

“We need to find my father.”

Before he could respond, my phone rang.

Unknown number.

I answered.

Nobody spoke.

Then I heard breathing.

“Hello?”

A voice finally whispered,

“You should have stayed in your car.”

The call ended.

I stared at the screen.

Richard reached for the phone.

“Did they say anything else?”

I shook my head.

Then another message arrived.

A photograph.

I opened it.

It showed my old sedan.

Parked in the empty lot where I'd slept the previous night.

Someone had taken the photograph from only a few feet away.

My blood went cold.

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Then another text appeared.

You are not the heir. You are the bait.