Chapter 5 - FIFTY-NINE SECONDS“Everybody out.”
Daniel didn't shout.
He didn't need to.
His men moved instantly.
I didn't.
Olivia was still tied to the chair.
“Emily, leave.”
“No.”
“That's not a request.”
“She is my friend.”
“And if that's an explosive device, standing beside her helps nobody.”
He was right.
I hated that he was right.
A police bomb technician waiting outside rushed in.
Daniel pulled me behind a concrete pillar.
The numbers kept falling.
Forty-three.
Forty-two.
Olivia screamed.
The technician dropped beside her and examined the device.
Then he looked toward us.
“It's fake.”
Silence.
The countdown reached zero.
Nothing happened.
Olivia collapsed sobbing.
Daniel didn't relax.
“It's theater,” he said.
Nathan understood first.
“He wanted us here.”
Daniel's head snapped toward him.
“The warehouse.”
His phone rang almost immediately.
South Harbor.
Someone had entered Brooks Maritime using an executive access code while Daniel's security was concentrated at Pier Nineteen.
The vault.
Vale hadn't wanted our key.
He had wanted Daniel away from the building.
Except there was one problem.
The intruders didn't have the box number.
Nathan smiled grimly.
“I never wrote it down.”
Daniel looked at him.
“Where is it?”
Nathan pointed at the key.
“That's not the vault key.”
Daniel frowned.
“What is it?”
“The box number.”
For the first time all night, Daniel looked impressed.
Nathan shrugged.
“I survived twenty-three years for a reason.”
Police freed Olivia.
Megan and Claire were found locked inside a nearby office, frightened but unharmed.
Olivia tried to hug me.
I stepped back.
Pain crossed her face.
“Emily.”
“I can't do this right now.”
“I didn't know.”
“You took money to manipulate me.”
“I was desperate.”
“I understand desperate.”
My voice shook.
“But you didn't ask me for help. You sold access to me.”
She started crying again.
I wanted to comfort her.
That was the problem with loving someone who hurt you.
Your affection didn't disappear on schedule.
Daniel stepped beside me without touching me.
His presence gave me enough strength to walk away.
We reached Brooks Maritime shortly after one in the morning.
Police had detained two men.
Neither would speak.
The old storage records were kept in a basement archive.
Box 317.
Daniel unlocked the secured room.
Nathan stood behind us.
“Twenty-three years,” he whispered.
A steel box sat on a shelf.
Daniel looked at me.
“Your choice.”
“Why mine?”
“Your father hid it for you.”
Nathan corrected him.
“I hid it because of her.”
I looked at him.
“There is a difference.”
He nodded sadly.
“Yes.”
I opened the box.
Inside were shipping manifests, bank records, photographs, and several cassette tapes.
The evidence implicated Raymond Vale in laundering money, bribing officials, and ordering violence against people who threatened to expose him.
But the final folder was different.
It contained records from Brooks Maritime.
Daniel read them twice.
His face lost all color.
“What?”
He handed me a document.
At the bottom was Thomas Brooks's signature.
His father.
Nathan looked over my shoulder.
“No.”
Daniel stared at him.
“You said my father discovered Vale's theft.”
“He did.”
“This says Thomas authorized the accounts.”
Nathan grabbed the page.
“He didn't.”
“That's his signature.”
“It's forged.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I forged it.”
Silence.
Daniel stepped toward him.
“What did you say?”
Nathan didn't move.
“Thomas ordered me to.”
“Why?”
“To make Vale believe Thomas was involved.”
Daniel's voice sharpened.
“Why would he do that?”
“Because Thomas was cooperating with federal investigators.”
Everything stopped.
Nathan explained.
By 2002, Thomas Brooks had realized Raymond Vale was using their shipping network for crimes Thomas had never authorized.
Thomas wanted out.
More importantly, he wanted his son out.
Daniel had been fourteen.
Thomas secretly gathered evidence.
Nathan helped.
Vale discovered the betrayal.
Three weeks later, Thomas's boat exploded.
Nathan was attacked two days after that.
Both deaths were blamed on accidents or rival criminals.
Daniel walked away from us.
For several minutes, he stood facing the concrete wall.
Then he punched it.
Once.
Blood appeared across his knuckles.
I approached slowly.
“Daniel.”
“Don't.”
I stopped.
He looked down at his hand.
“My entire life…”
His voice cracked for the first time.
“I spent twenty years becoming exactly what I thought I had to become because I believed my father died weak.”
Nathan's expression softened.
“Thomas wasn't weak.”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“No. Apparently he was trying to save me.”
“And he failed.”
Daniel looked at him.
Nathan didn't soften the truth.
“So you get to decide whether his failure becomes yours.”
Something passed between the two men.
Understanding, perhaps.
Or shared guilt.
Daniel turned to me.
“You should leave Boston.”
“What?”
“Until Vale is arrested.”
“No.”
“Emily.”
“Stop deciding where I go.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Someone kidnapped your friends tonight.”
“Because of information my father hid.”
“Exactly.”
“And running makes that disappear?”
“It keeps you alive.”
“I've spent fourteen months hiding from life because one man humiliated me. I'm not spending another twenty-three years hiding because another man threatens me.”
Nathan looked away.
He knew that sentence belonged partly to him.
Daniel stared at me.
Then something unexpected happened.
He smiled.
Barely.
“You're very difficult.”
“We've known each other six hours.”
“It has been an informative six hours.”
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Everyone froze.
Daniel held out his hand.
I shook my head and answered.
“Hello?”
Raymond Vale.
“Emily Carter.”
His voice was almost pleasant.
“You've caused considerable trouble.”
“You kidnapped my friends.”
“A misunderstanding.”
“You strapped a fake bomb to Olivia.”
“A demonstration.”
“Of what?”
“That Daniel Brooks cannot protect everyone.”
Daniel was listening.
Vale continued.
“Your father stole something from me.”
“No. He preserved evidence.”
“You've known him one evening. Be careful whom you trust.”
I looked at Nathan.
“What do you want?”
“The box.”
“You're not getting it.”
Vale laughed.
“You sound like Thomas.”
Then he said something that made Daniel go still.
“Ask Daniel why he was really at the Grand Oak.”
I looked at him.
Daniel's expression changed.
Vale continued.
“Your friend may have arranged the date, Emily.”
A pause.
“But Daniel Brooks already knew exactly who you were.”
The call ended.
I lowered the phone.
“Daniel?”
He said nothing.
“Did you know me before tonight?”
Nathan looked between us.
Daniel finally answered.
“Yes.”
The word hurt more than it should have.
“How?”
“Emily—”
“How?”
His gaze dropped to the photograph still sticking from my handbag.
The Christmas photograph.
“I saw you six months ago.”
“Where?”
“Maple Street Books.”
I stared.
“You were there?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Daniel took a slow breath.
“Because I had already started looking for Nathan Carter.”
My stomach dropped.
Suddenly every kind thing Daniel had done had a second explanation.
The blind date.
The photograph.
His willingness to protect me.
His interest in my father.
I stepped away.
“You didn't come tonight for me.”
Daniel looked directly into my eyes.
“No.”
The answer was devastatingly simple.
May you like
Then he added:
“But that's why I stayed.”
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