Chapter 6 - THE GRAVE
Anthony Calder had been dead for seven years.
His grave sat beneath a stone angel in a private family section of Mount Carmel Cemetery.
Dominic did not speak during the drive.
Evelyn sat beside him in the back of the armored SUV.
“You don’t have to come,” he said eventually.
“My father died because of whatever is inside that coffin.”
“That’s exactly why you shouldn’t.”
“That argument stopped working when someone shot at my apartment.”
He looked at her.
“You’re stubborn.”
“So I’ve been told.”
“By Molly?”
“Mostly by you.”
“I’ve known you eleven months.”
“You learned fast.”
That earned the smallest smile.
At the cemetery, Eleanor explained what had happened seven years earlier.
Anthony knew Victor had discovered that evidence existed.
So before his death, he gave Eleanor a sealed packet.
“If anything happens to me,” Anthony had told her, “put this where Victor will never voluntarily look.”
His own coffin.
“He knew he was going to die?” Dominic asked.
“He knew it was possible.”
“And you said nothing to me.”
“You were thirty-one and angry at the world. You would have gone after Victor that night.”
“I should have.”
“No. You would have died.”
Dominic looked away.
A court order allowed the private exhumation under the pretext of relocating the family grave.
Only a small trusted crew was present.
When the coffin was raised, Evelyn’s stomach tightened.
The funeral director opened the outer vault.
A sealed metal compartment had been attached beneath it.
Inside was a waterproof case.
Dominic opened it.
Ledgers.
Bank records.
Photographs.
Audio recordings.
Enough evidence to destroy Victor Calder.
And several people more powerful than him.
Evelyn picked up a folder marked REED.
Inside was the police report from her father’s death.
Attached to it was a photograph showing his car before the crash.
The brake line had been cut.
She sat down.
For six years she had believed rain and exhaustion had killed her father.
Now she knew someone had deliberately sent his car into a concrete barrier.
Dominic crouched in front of her.
“You don’t have to read it here.”
“I spent six years blaming him.”
“For what?”
“For working too much. For driving tired.”
Her voice broke.
“I was angry at him for dying.”
Dominic said nothing.
He simply remained there.
Evelyn wiped her eyes.
“I hate crying.”
“So do I.”
“You don’t cry.”
“You’d be surprised.”
She looked at him.
He reached toward her, hesitated, then gently wiped a tear from beneath her eye.
Neither moved.
The cemetery disappeared for one strange second.
Then gunfire erupted.
Dominic threw Evelyn behind the stone monument.
Men scattered.
The funeral crew ran.
Victor’s men had entered through the western gate.
Dominic returned fire while pulling Evelyn toward the SUV.
“Stay down!”
A bullet shattered a window.
Eleanor was trapped behind another vehicle.
“Mom!”
Dominic started toward her.
Evelyn grabbed his sleeve.
“Wait.”
She had seen movement.
A shooter behind the mausoleum was watching Dominic, waiting for him to cross open ground.
Evelyn pointed.
“Left side.”
Dominic saw him.
He changed direction, using the stone monuments for cover.
His security team closed in.
Within minutes, the attackers retreated.
Eleanor was unharmed.
But the waterproof case was gone.
Victor’s men had taken it during the chaos.
Dominic slammed his fist against the SUV.
“We lost everything.”
“No,” Evelyn said.
He looked at her.
She held up the REED folder.
“I kept this.”
“That proves your father’s murder, not Victor’s entire operation.”
“Maybe that’s enough to start.”
Dominic shook his head.
“Victor owns people in the police department. Prosecutors. City inspectors. A single murder file disappears.”
Eleanor approached.
“Anthony made copies.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Dominic laughed bitterly.
“Of course.”
Evelyn looked through the folder again.
One page contained a handwritten line from Thomas.
The safest copy is the one nobody knows is evidence.
Below it were four numbers.
17-4-23-9.
“What does that mean?”
Evelyn stared.
Then remembered.
Her father had played number games with Molly and her when they were children.
Numbers corresponded to letters.
17 was Q.
4 was D.
23 was W.
9 was I.
That made no sense.
Unless the numbers were not letters.
“Books,” she whispered.
“What?”
“My father used to hide birthday presents and give us library clues. First number was page. Second was paragraph. Third was line.”
“Which book?”
Evelyn looked at the folder.
A tiny drawing sat beside the numbers.
A bird.
She smiled through her tears.
“His favorite book.”
“Where is it?”
“Molly has it.”
Back at the mansion, Molly retrieved Thomas’s battered copy of To Kill a Mockingbird from her overnight bag.
They followed the numbers.
The selected words formed a sentence.
ASK EVIE ABOUT THE RED MUSIC BOX.
Molly frowned.
“What red music box?”
Evelyn went still.
There had been one.
Their mother’s.
Evelyn had kept it after the funeral.
She had never opened the bottom compartment because the winding mechanism had broken when she was a teenager.
It was now inside a storage box in her apartment.
Dominic immediately sent men.
Two hours later, the music box sat on his desk.
Evelyn removed the felt lining.
Underneath was a memory card.
Dominic stared at it.
“Your father really didn’t trust banks.”
“My father didn’t trust anybody.”
“Smart man.”
They inserted the card.
Hundreds of files appeared.
Dominic opened the first.
Victor’s voice filled the room.
Clear.
Unmistakable.
Ordering Thomas Reed’s death.
Evelyn closed her eyes.
Then another file appeared.
A video.
Recorded only three weeks earlier.
Victor sat across from someone in a restaurant.
Dominic leaned toward the screen.
The other man turned.
Evelyn heard Dominic whisper, “Impossible.”
“Who is he?”
May you like
Dominic’s face had gone white.
“My father.”
