Chapter 6 - THE PRICE OF KEEPING HANNAH ALIVE
Lena’s clinic had been torn apart.
Hannah saw the broken back door from half a block away.
She tried to leave the SUV before Elias stopped.
“No.”
“That’s my friend.”
“There could still be shooters.”
“Then move faster.”
Nicholas said, “Two men first.”
Hannah turned on him.
“If Lena is hurt—”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
Nicholas looked at her.
Hannah immediately regretted it.
He knew exactly what losing someone felt like.
That was the problem.
Everyone in the vehicle knew too well.
Elias sent two men inside.
Thirty seconds.
Then one appeared.
“Clear.”
Hannah ran.
The examination room was destroyed.
Cabinet doors ripped open.
Medication scattered.
A chair overturned.
Blood marked the floor.
“Lena!”
Nothing.
Hannah followed the blood into the hall.
Not much.
Drops.
Then a smear.
Near the front desk lay Lena’s phone.
The screen was cracked.
Hannah picked it up.
A text message waited.
Unknown number.
BRING NICHOLAS THE DRIVE. COME ALONE IF YOU WANT THE DOCTOR BACK.
Hannah looked behind her.
Nicholas had entered.
He read the message.
“No.”
“It doesn’t say you.”
“It says bring Nicholas the drive.”
“It says me.”
“No.”
Hannah’s voice hardened.
“You don’t get to decide.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Why?”
“Because they took her to get to you through me.”
“That makes no sense.”
“It makes perfect sense.”
Nicholas took the phone.
“They know I will come if you go.”
Hannah stared at him.
“Why would they think that?”
Nobody answered.
Even Elias looked away.
Hannah’s expression changed.
“Oh.”
Nicholas said, “Don’t.”
“Oh.”
“Hannah.”
“You’re going to explain that later.”
“If there is a later.”
“There will be.”
Nicholas studied the message.
“Drive means the USB.”
Elias shook his head.
“We give them a copy.”
“They’ll test it.”
“We stall.”
“They kill the doctor.”
Hannah’s face tightened.
“Her name is Lena.”
Nicholas met her eyes.
“I know.”
He handed back the phone.
“We find the location.”
“How?”
“People who send threats make mistakes.”
Hannah looked at the number.
“It’s probably disposable.”
“It is.”
“You sound confident.”
“I have experience receiving threats.”
He turned to Elias.
“Check street cameras. Vehicles entering the alley in the last hour.”
Elias nodded.
“On it.”
Hannah went into Lena’s office.
“What are you doing?”
“Thinking.”
She looked around.
Lena was organized.
Obsessively organized.
Every appointment noted.
Every supply labeled.
Every key hung in one place.
One hook was empty.
Hannah stared.
“What?”
“Her old Honda.”
Elias entered.
“Security feed caught a gray Honda leaving six minutes before we arrived.”
“License plate?”
Hannah recited it from memory.
Elias looked at her.
“You memorize your friend’s plate?”
“She parks illegally.”
The vehicle was tracked through traffic cameras.
South.
Then east.
Toward the industrial shoreline.
The last camera caught it entering a fenced property owned by Chesapeake Agricultural Storage.
Elias checked the corporate registration.
Shell company.
Parent company connected to Rourke Maritime.
Nicholas almost smiled.
“Victor’s getting lazy.”
“Or he wants us to find it,” Hannah said.
Nicholas looked at her.
“Yes.”
They planned for twenty minutes.
Hannah hated every minute.
Nicholas wanted her nowhere near the property.
Hannah wanted to walk through the front gate herself.
They compromised by making both of them unhappy.
Hannah would ride with Nicholas.
Elias’s teams would remain outside the visible perimeter.
The real USB stayed elsewhere.
A duplicate went into Hannah’s pocket.
Nicholas carried no visible weapon.
At 10:07 in the morning, they entered the warehouse.
Lena sat tied to a chair beneath a hanging work lamp.
Her lip was split.
But she was awake.
“Hannah!”
Hannah moved forward.
Nicholas stopped her with one arm.
A man stepped from behind a shipping container.
Victor Rourke.
He was older than Nicholas.
Forty-five.
Silver beginning at his temples.
Beautiful suit.
No hurry.
Hannah had expected a monster.
Instead Victor looked like someone who might chair a hospital fundraiser.
“That,” he said, looking at Hannah, “is the medic.”
Hannah felt Nicholas stiffen.
Victor smiled.
“I’ve wanted to meet you for years.”
“The feeling isn’t mutual.”
“I can see why Joseph liked you.”
Hannah’s stomach twisted.
“You poisoned your brother.”
Victor’s smile thinned.
“Joseph poisoned himself with guilt.”
“He was murdered.”
“He made choices.”
Nicholas interrupted.
“Let Lena go.”
Victor looked at him.
“You look better than expected.”
“Disappointed?”
“Impressed.”
Victor walked closer.
“The cleaner was an extraordinary coincidence.”
Nicholas said nothing.
Victor looked at Hannah.
“One wrong digit.”
Hannah’s blood went cold.
“How do you know that?”
Victor smiled.
“Because it wasn’t wrong.”
Silence.
Hannah whispered, “What?”
Nicholas turned slightly toward her.
Victor enjoyed it.
“Your schedule was changed intentionally.”
“By who?”
“Frank Delaney.”
Hannah stared.
Victor continued.
“Poor Frank finally developed a conscience.”
The pieces moved.
Frank knew Nicholas was being held in Curtis Bay.
Frank could not call police without exposing himself.
He could not warn Nicholas’s men because Daniel would intercept it.
So he changed one cleaning assignment.
Sent Hannah.
The medic he had betrayed four years earlier.
The woman he knew would not leave a dying stranger behind.
Hannah felt tears sting her eyes.
Frank had tried to make one thing right.
Victor tilted his head.
“Touching, isn’t it?”
“You killed him.”
“No.”
Nicholas watched Victor’s face.
“Daniel did.”
Victor smiled.
Hannah looked at Nicholas.
“How do you know?”
“Because Victor wants me angry at Daniel.”
Victor laughed softly.
“There he is.”
Nicholas moved half a step forward.
“Where is my brother?”
“Nearby.”
Lena shouted, “Hannah, don’t give them anything!”
A guard struck the back of her chair.
Hannah flinched.
Nicholas did not.
But his eyes changed.
Victor saw it.
“USB.”
Hannah removed it.
Victor held out his hand.
She tossed it onto the floor instead.
The drive skidded.
Victor looked annoyed.
A guard retrieved it.
Inserted it into a laptop.
Files opened.
Victor nodded.
“Untie the doctor.”
The guard moved toward Lena.
Hannah exhaled.
Then another voice came from behind them.
“Don’t.”
Nicholas closed his eyes briefly.
Hannah turned.
Daniel Vale stepped from the shadows.
He held a gun.
Not at Nicholas.
At Lena.
Nicholas’s face revealed nothing.
“Danny.”
Daniel flinched at the childhood name.
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m not nine anymore.”
“No.”
Nicholas looked at the gun.
“You’re not.”
Daniel’s eyes were red.
He looked as if he had not slept in days.
“You shouldn’t have survived.”
The words landed harder than the gunshot ever could.
Nicholas said nothing.
Daniel swallowed.
“I didn’t mean—”
“You chained me in a basement.”
“Victor’s men did.”
“You gave them my route.”
Daniel looked away.
Nicholas’s voice remained calm.
“Look at me.”
Daniel did.
“Did you give them my route?”
“Yes.”
Hannah watched Nicholas absorb it.
No anger.
Not yet.
Only grief.
“Why?”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“Because you never let me become anything except your little brother.”
Nicholas stared.
“I gave you half the company.”
“You gave me whatever you didn’t want to handle.”
“I protected you.”
“You controlled me.”
“I raised you.”
“That was the problem!”
Daniel’s voice cracked.
Victor watched with quiet satisfaction.
Daniel continued.
“Every room I walked into, people looked behind me for you. Every decision I made needed your approval. Every mistake became another reason Nicholas had to save Daniel.”
Nicholas’s expression hardened.
“So you tried to murder me.”
Daniel looked ashamed for one second.
Then angry again.
“You were supposed to disappear.”
“Difference?”
“I didn’t want to see it!”
That sentence silenced everyone.
Nicholas took a step forward.
Daniel raised the gun.
“Stop.”
Nicholas stopped.
“What did you see the night Mom died?”
Daniel’s face emptied.
Victor’s smile vanished.
Nicholas knew.
That reaction told him.
“You saw the bomb.”
Daniel whispered, “Nick.”
“Who put it in her car?”
“Don’t.”
“Who?”
Daniel’s hand started shaking.
Nicholas stepped closer.
“Was it Rourke?”
Daniel’s eyes filled.
“No.”
“Was it Dad?”
Silence.
Nicholas’s face changed.
May you like
Daniel whispered:
“I saw Dad do it.”
