CHAPTER 7 THE TRADE
Meridian Tower had been abandoned halfway through construction.
The twenty-two-story concrete skeleton stood on the edge of the waterfront, wrapped in torn safety netting and rusted scaffolding.
Construction had stopped when Meridian Continental defaulted on its development loans.
Grant’s failing company had poured millions into the building before he joined Brooks Urban Development.
Now I understood why he needed Ryan’s signature.
The Singapore contract was not about expansion.
It was a rescue package.
Brooks Urban Development would guarantee Meridian’s debts, restart the tower, and absorb every hidden liability Grant had spent years concealing.
If Ryan refused, Grant lost everything.
At 8:32 the next morning, I sat inside an armored FBI vehicle two blocks away.
Agent Ward checked the tracking device sewn into the lining of my coat.
“You will remain in the lobby,” she said. “You will not enter an elevator or stairwell.”
“He may force me.”
“Then we move.”
“And Lucas?”
“Our medical team is staged nearby.”
“What if Grant sees them?”
“He won’t.”
I looked at the leather-bound ledger on my lap.
It was a duplicate.
The original remained secured as evidence.
The copy was nearly perfect, including Thomas’s handwriting, stains, and worn binding. Only a forensic examination would reveal the difference.
My hands were steady.
That surprised me.
Perhaps fear had limits.
Once a person experienced enough of it, something else took over.
Focus.
“I need one promise,” I said.
Ward watched me.
“If you have to choose between arresting Grant and saving Lucas, save my son.”
“That is already the priority.”
“And Ryan.”
“We bring them both home.”
I stepped from the vehicle.
Cold rain drifted across the empty street.
Every movement pulled at my surgical wound. Beneath my coat, I wore a medical support band and a small microphone.
The tower entrance had no doors.
Wind moved through the unfinished lobby.
Plastic sheeting snapped overhead.
“Grant?” I called.
My voice echoed through the concrete space.
A speaker crackled near the elevator shaft.
“Place your phone on the ground.”
I did.
“Open your coat.”
I obeyed.
“Turn around.”
I turned slowly.
He was watching from somewhere above.
“Take the construction elevator to the seventeenth floor.”
Agent Ward’s voice sounded faintly through my hidden earpiece.
“Do not enter.”
I looked at the rusted temporary elevator.
“No.”
Grant’s voice sharpened.
“Excuse me?”
“You said to bring the ledger. I brought it. Bring Lucas downstairs.”
“You are not negotiating.”
“I am the only person here holding the thing you need.”
Silence followed.
I continued.
“If you wanted me dead, you could have killed me already. You want the ledger because you don’t know how many copies exist. You want to question me.”
“You give yourself too much importance.”
“Then come take it.”
Behind a concrete pillar, something moved.
A man stepped into view.
Grant Mercer wore a dark raincoat and carried a handgun.
His face looked different without the polished confidence he wore at corporate dinners.
Older.
Hollow.
Desperate.
“You should have stayed in accounting,” he said.
“You should have stayed out of kidnapping.”
“Ryan forced this.”
“By refusing to sign away his company?”
“By pretending business decisions are moral decisions.”
“You stole more than twenty million dollars.”
“I redirected capital.”
“You murdered Thomas.”
“Patricia handled Thomas.”
The admission came casually.
He realized his mistake one second too late.
His eyes narrowed.
“You’re recording.”
“I’m standing in an empty building with an armed kidnapper. Of course I’m recording.”
Grant raised the gun.
“Remove the microphone.”
“No.”
“I will shoot you.”
“Then you’ll never know where the original ledger is.”
He stared at the book.
“That’s not the original?”
“Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t.”
His jaw tightened.
“Where is Lucas?”
“Safe.”
“I want to see him.”
Grant gestured toward the elevator.
“Seventeenth floor.”
“You bring him here.”
“I don’t take orders from you.”
“Then you don’t get the ledger.”
Grant looked toward the upper levels.
A second figure appeared behind the plastic sheeting above us.
Brianna.
She held something small in her arms.
A portable infant carrier.
My knees almost collapsed.
Lucas’s face was barely visible through the clear cover.
Tubes ran from his body to portable equipment.
Brianna stood dangerously close to the unfinished ledge.
“Give him the book!” she shouted. “I’m tired of carrying this thing.”
This thing.
She was talking about my son.
Grant extended his free hand.
“The ledger.”
“Bring Lucas down.”
“Brianna stays where she is until I verify the book.”
I looked at her.
She looked frightened, exhausted, and angry.
Not remorseful.
Never remorseful.
“Brianna,” I called, “Lucas could die.”
“That’s not my problem.”
“He is your nephew.”
“He’s the reason Ryan stopped helping me.”
“Ryan stopped giving you money because you stole from him.”
“He owed me!”
Grant glanced upward.
“Enough.”
Brianna shifted the carrier carelessly.
My heart lurched.
“Stop moving him!”
“Then give Grant what he wants!”
A voice came from somewhere above Brianna.
“Evelyn.”
Ryan.
He stepped into view with his hands tied in front of him.
His face was bruised. One eye was swollen. A man stood behind him holding a weapon.
Ryan looked down seventeen floors and found me.
For one second, the tower disappeared.
The kidnappers.
The rain.
The fear.
All I saw was my husband alive.
“Are Sophie and Lucas alive?” he shouted.
“Sophie is safe. Lucas is with Brianna.”
Ryan looked toward the carrier.
His face changed.
“Let him go!”
Grant moved closer to me.
“The ledger.”
I held it against my chest.
“Release them first.”
“You are in no position to demand conditions.”
“You need Ryan’s signature. You need the ledger. You need me to confirm there are no copies. That means you need all three of us alive.”
Grant smiled faintly.
“For the moment.”
He reached for the book.
I stepped backward.
“Tell me where Patricia is.”
“That does not concern you.”
“She planned the assault.”
“She planned far more than that.”
“Did she order Thomas’s death?”
Grant’s eyes flicked toward the upper floor.
“She suggested a medical solution.”
“Did she order Ryan’s kidnapping?”
“She agreed it was necessary.”
“Where is she?”
Grant’s patience broke.
He grabbed the ledger from my hands.
At that moment, Agent Ward spoke through my earpiece.
“Move left.”
I dropped to the floor.
Gunfire exploded across the lobby.
Grant spun toward the entrance as FBI agents emerged behind concrete barriers.
His gun fired once.
The bullet struck a pillar.
I crawled behind a stack of cement bags.
Above us, Brianna screamed.
The armed man behind Ryan dragged him backward.
Ryan drove his shoulder into the man’s chest.
They crashed against the plastic sheeting.
Brianna lost her balance.
The infant carrier slid across the wet concrete toward the edge.
“No!” I screamed.
Brianna grabbed one handle at the last second.
The carrier hung partly over the drop.
Lucas began crying.
Ryan kicked the gunman away and lunged toward the carrier, but his tied hands prevented him from reaching it.
Brianna screamed down at Grant.
“Help me!”
Grant ran toward the stairwell.
Agent Ward fired, striking him in the leg.
He collapsed near the elevator shaft.
Agents surrounded him.
On the seventeenth floor, Ryan wrapped his bound arms around a support column and extended one foot toward the infant carrier.
“Brianna, pull him up!”
“I can’t!”
“You can!”
“He’s too heavy!”
“He weighs less than four pounds!”
Brianna’s fingers slipped.
Ryan threw himself onto the concrete and caught the carrier handle between his bound wrists.
The movement dragged half his body toward the ledge.
The gunman recovered behind him.
He lifted his weapon.
A sniper’s shot cracked through the tower.
The gunman fell backward.
Tactical officers rushed onto the seventeenth floor.
They secured Brianna first.
Then they pulled Ryan and Lucas away from the edge.
I remained on the lobby floor, unable to breathe until a voice came through Ward’s radio.
“Infant secured. Father secured. Both alive.”
My body folded with relief.
Paramedics carried Lucas down in a specialized transport incubator.
I stood unsteadily as they approached.
A pediatric doctor checked his oxygen level.
“He’s stable,” she told me. “His temperature is low, but his heart rate is strong.”
I placed one hand against the clear cover.
“Mommy’s here.”
Ryan came down behind him on a stretcher.
His wrists were bruised and bleeding.
When he saw me, he tried to sit up.
“Evelyn.”
I moved toward him.
We reached for each other between the paramedics.
His hand closed around mine.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“For what?”
“For trusting them.”
“You’re here.”
“I left you alone.”
“You came back.”
He looked toward Lucas.
“Our babies?”
“Alive.”
Ryan began crying.
I leaned over the stretcher and pressed my forehead against his.
Across the lobby, agents placed Grant Mercer in handcuffs.
Brianna was brought down moments later, screaming that Grant had manipulated her.
Then Detective Harris approached us.
“We found Patricia.”
Ryan looked up.
“Where?”
“She was arrested at a private airfield attempting to leave the country.”
“Was she alone?”
“No.”
“Who was with her?”
Harris glanced toward the FBI agents.
“Your company’s board chairman.”
The corruption reached higher than any of us imagined.
But Ryan was alive.
May you like
Lucas was safe.
And for the first time since Brianna entered my kitchen, the people responsible were the ones who could not escape.
