Chapter 5 - Rachel’s Last SecretEli ran toward the sound before anyone could stop him.
Miles caught him at the corridor.
“Eli!”
“That was her signal!”
“Your mother is dead.”
“I know!”
The words tore from him.
“That's why somebody else knowing it matters.”
Miles released him.
The boy was right.
They searched the hallway and found no intruder.
Instead, beneath a service cart, Eli discovered an old photograph.
Rachel held him as a baby.
On the back were three words.
ASK SILAS WHY.
Eli marched straight into Silas’s room.
“Why what?”
Silas stared at the photograph.
All color left his face.
Harper closed the door.
Silas finally confessed.
Twelve years earlier, Rachel had not gone to him merely because she had discovered financial crimes.
She had come because she believed someone was planning to kill Malcolm Ror.
Silas had been twenty-eight and arrogant enough to believe his father untouchable.
He dismissed her warning.
Three weeks later Malcolm died in what police ruled a boating accident.
Rachel disappeared the same night.
“I thought she had been involved,” Silas said.
Eli’s eyes hardened.
“You thought my mother killed him?”
“Yes.”
“And that's why you stopped looking?”
Silas did not defend himself.
“Yes.”
Eli walked away.
Silas called after him.
“I was wrong.”
Eli stopped.
“You being wrong cost us twelve years.”
That evening, Harper found Silas alone.
“You want the boy to forgive you.”
“I don't deserve it.”
“That isn't your decision.”
Silas looked toward the window.
“I spent half my life believing strength meant never owing anyone anything.”
Harper sat beside him.
“Then a twelve-year-old with nothing saved your life.”
Silas gave a humorless smile.
“Apparently the universe has a sense of humor.”
Meanwhile Miles had traced the photograph.
The paper came from an instant printer manufactured only six years earlier.
Rachel had been dead for two.
Someone had copied an older image recently.
The person tormenting them possessed Rachel’s belongings.
Then Eli remembered a storage unit his mother had visited during the last year of her life.
They drove there under heavy security.
Inside Unit 88 were boxes of clothing, tax documents and childhood toys.
Eli found his old stuffed dog.
He hugged it before remembering people were watching and quickly put it down.
Harper quietly picked it up and carried it for him.
At the rear of the unit stood a steel case.
Inside was a video camera.
One recording remained.
Rachel appeared on screen.
Older.
Tired.
Terrified.
Eli covered his mouth.
“Baby,” she began, looking directly into the camera, “if you're watching this, I didn't get enough time.”
Eli began crying before he could stop himself.
Rachel explained everything.
Malcolm Ror had indeed been murdered.
But not by a rival.
The conspiracy came from within his own organization.
She had discovered the killer’s identity.
Before she could say the name, the recording glitched.
Miles cursed.
The file had been deliberately corrupted.
But another portion remained.
Rachel held up a small metal token.
“The evidence is stored where Malcolm believed no son of his would ever look.”
Silas frowned.
Then his expression changed.
“Our old church.”
Malcolm Ror had hated religion after the death of his wife.
He never entered St. Matthew’s again.
But his wife was buried in its cemetery.
They arrived after dark.
Beneath the loose stone behind Malcolm’s wife’s memorial plaque, Miles found a waterproof box.
Inside was a ledger.
And the original tracking records from Black Harbor.
Harper turned pages.
Then stopped.
Every illegal transfer carried an authorization code.
MR-2.
Silas whispered, “Second Ror.”
Adrian.
Eli shook his head.
“No.”
Everyone looked at him.
“The man in the woods was taller.”
“Than Adrian?” Miles asked.
“Way taller.”
Silas looked through the ledger again.
Then he found something.
MR-2 did not mean second Ror.
It was a designation created before Adrian was born.
Malcolm Ror had had another partner.
Marcus Reed.
The initials were reversed in company records to disguise ownership.
Miles went rigid.
Marcus Reed had supposedly died eighteen years ago.
Harper whispered, “Supposedly?”
A noise came from the cemetery.
Gravel crunching.
Miles drew his weapon.
A tall figure stepped from behind the church.
Gray hair.
Long black coat.
And a pronounced limp in his right leg.
Eli’s blood went cold.
“That’s him.”
The third man from the forest.
The stranger stopped beneath the cemetery lamp.
Silas stared through the windshield as if he were seeing a ghost.
Because he was.
“Marcus?”
The man smiled.
“Hello, Silas.”
Then he looked past him.
May you like
Straight at Eli.
“And hello, grandson.”
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