Chapter 6 — The Price of Ten Minutes
Naomi did not touch the tablet.
“Camera,” she said.
I scanned the motel room.
A red light glowed inside the smoke detector.
My father was watching.
Naomi stepped beneath it.
“Charles, deleting the video after issuing a demand converts this into witness tampering and extortion.”
The countdown continued.
00:08:41.
A voice came through the television speakers.
“Still hiding behind statutes, Naomi?”
Charles.
I walked toward the camera.
“Where is Dade?”
“Safe for the moment.”
“And the watch?”
“Also safe.”
“What do you want?”
“You know what I want.”
“The trust proxy.”
“Signed, notarized, and delivered to Victor before midnight. You will also withdraw every allegation concerning Tobias and state publicly that the recording was misunderstood.”
“And Dade?”
“He will be permitted to continue his life.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because you have always known I keep my agreements.”
That was the most convincing lie my father ever told.
He kept agreements only while they served him.
The countdown reached seven minutes.
Naomi moved beside me and spoke quietly enough that the microphone would struggle to capture every word.
“He needs us focused on the screen.”
“Meaning?”
“This room is a delay.”
She pointed toward a faint streak of blood near the door.
It continued into the parking lot.
We left the tablet counting down and followed the trail.
Behind the motel, tire marks cut through a patch of mud. A shattered taillight lay near the dumpsters.
Naomi photographed it.
“Recent model SUV,” she said. “Probably Mercer.”
A low groan came from beyond the drainage ditch.
We found Dade beneath a fallen section of wooden fencing.
His wrists were bound. Blood covered one side of his face, but he was conscious.
“They took it,” he whispered.
“The watch?” I asked.
He nodded.
“Mercer knew I copied the video.”
“Where is he going?”
“Bank.”
Naomi checked the time.
The Richmond branch closed at seven, but private clients could enter the vault by appointment.
Charles had one key.
Now Mercer had the second.
They did not need guardianship if they could force the bank manager to accept forged documents and both physical keys.
“What is on the full video?” I asked.
Dade looked at me with shame.
“Everything.”
“Who hit Toby?”
“Mercer started. Your father told him to stop leaving marks on the face. Then Victor said injuries would make the custody story believable.”
My vision narrowed.
Dade continued quickly.
“I tried to stop it. Mercer knocked me down. When the kid couldn’t stand, your father told me to take him somewhere he would be found.”
“Why didn’t you call the police?”
“Chief Price called me first. He said I’d be charged if I told the truth.”
“You abandoned an injured child.”
“I know.”
“You listened while my son begged for me.”
His eyes filled.
“I know.”
For a second, I wanted him to carry that guilt alone.
Then I thought of Toby asking whether the bad men were police.
“Help us now,” I said.
Dade told us the full video had been copied to the watch after the library’s internal camera system malfunctioned. He had secretly activated his body camera when Charles began threatening Toby.
Mercer discovered the recording after Dade sent me the photograph.
The video on the motel tablet was only a shortened duplicate. Destroying it would not matter if we recovered the watch.
Naomi called an ambulance, then contacted the bank’s security office and the state police.
We reached Richmond at 7:23.
Police vehicles surrounded the building, but the bank manager insisted no one had entered the vault after closing.
Naomi showed him the emergency preservation request.
“Check your internal access logs.”
He looked nervous.
“Those records are confidential.”
“A child was assaulted to obtain access to a box in your vault.”
“I’ll need authorization.”
“You received authorization four hours ago.”
While they argued, I looked through the glass doors.
The main lobby was empty.
A security camera slowly rotated toward us.
Then I noticed a service entrance near the parking garage.
“The manager is delaying us,” I said.
Naomi studied him.
Sweat glistened near his collar.
She stepped closer.
“Mr. Palmer, where is Victor Hale?”
The manager’s eyes flickered toward the garage.
State police moved immediately.
We entered the underground level and found a black sedan parked beside a private elevator. Its engine was still running.
Mercer lay unconscious in the back seat.
Victor had left him behind.
The elevator opened directly into the vault corridor.
Inside, alarms began sounding.
We reached the safety-deposit room as Victor emerged carrying a steel document case.
He stopped when he saw us.
Two bank security guards stood behind him, but neither seemed willing to defend him.
“Give me the case,” Naomi said.
Victor smiled.
“This property belongs to my client.”
“It belongs to a trust beneficiary.”
“Your interpretation.”
“Then you won’t mind letting a court decide.”
He tightened his grip.
“You should have accepted Charles’s offer, Ethan.”
“You helped beat my child.”
“I never touched him.”
“You wrote the lie that made the beating useful.”
For the first time, Victor’s polished expression broke.
“You think your father wanted this? Claire forced his hand. Margaret forced his hand. Your mother forced his hand. Every woman in that family mistook disobedience for courage.”
Naomi’s phone was recording.
Victor realized too late.
He moved toward the garage.
State troopers blocked the corridor.
The steel case was taken from him.
Inside were pension ledgers, encrypted drives, copies of judicial payments, and Claire’s handwritten notes.
But Toby’s watch was not there.
Neither was the original video.
Victor laughed when Naomi asked about it.
“Charles has always understood that evidence is only valuable when someone survives to present it.”
A state trooper handcuffed him.
“Where is the watch?” I demanded.
Victor leaned close.
“You still haven’t learned. The watch was never the most dangerous thing Claire left behind.”
“What was?”
“A witness.”
He looked toward my phone.
Then at the hospital’s number displayed on the screen.
My blood turned cold.
I called Dr. Carter.
No answer.
I called the nurses’ station.
A panicked voice answered.
“Mr. Sinclair, the hospital lost power six minutes ago. The backup system is failing on the pediatric floor.”
“What about Toby?”
“Dr. Carter moved him, but we can’t locate them.”
Naomi was already running toward the elevator.
I heard shouting through the hospital phone.
Then a fire alarm.
A man’s voice came across the line.
“Seal the stairwell.”
Graham Mercer was unconscious behind us.
Victor was in handcuffs.
That left only one man with enough authority to enter a hospital during an emergency and command police officers without question.
Chief Nolan Price.
May you like
My father had sent him to take Toby.
And this time, Charles no longer needed my son alive.
