Chapter 8 - He Took My Children
There are kinds of fear language cannot accurately describe.
The fear of losing money has words.
Ruin.
Bankruptcy.
Failure.
The fear of losing power has words too.
Defeat.
Exposure.
Humiliation.
But the moment someone tells you your children have been taken, language becomes useless.
Everything primitive inside you takes over.
I don’t remember crossing the room.
I remember Marcus appearing.
I remember grabbing his jacket.
“How?”
“Ethan—”
“How did he get them?”
“The school had Caldwell listed as an approved emergency contact.”
Of course he was.
Lauren and I had added him years ago.
Godfather.
Best friend.
Family.
The administrators knew his face.
He apparently arrived claiming I had suffered a medical emergency and asked the school not to frighten the boys.
Jordan and Justin refused at first.
Then Richard told them Annie had been hurt.
They went with him.
I could barely breathe.
“He used her.”
Annie had gone white.
Walsh arrived twelve minutes later with federal agents.
Kidnapping transformed the investigation immediately.
Phones were traced.
Traffic cameras pulled.
Highway toll records monitored.
Richard’s known accounts frozen.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
Every person in the room stopped.
Walsh pointed at the speakerphone.
I answered.
“Richard.”
A soft laugh.
“You always were faster after someone lit a fire under you.”
My fists clenched.
“Let me speak to my sons.”
“They’re fine.”
“Let me hear them.”
“First, we talk.”
“If you hurt them—”
“Stop.”
His voice sharpened.
“You think I want to hurt those boys?”
“You killed their mother.”
Silence.
Then:
“Lauren made choices.”
Annie closed her eyes.
I nearly shattered the phone.
“She was trapped in a wreck, and you stole evidence while she died.”
“She should have stayed out of things she didn’t understand.”
My vision narrowed.
Walsh wrote on a pad.
KEEP HIM TALKING.
“What do you want?”
“The drive.”
“What drive?”
“Don’t insult me.”
Lauren’s evidence.
“How do you know I have it?”
“Because federal agents are searching my properties.”
“You’ve lost.”
Richard laughed.
“No, Ethan. Losing is when there’s nothing left to trade.”
A child whimpered in the background.
My heart stopped.
“Jordan?”
“Daddy!”
The line shifted.
“Daddy, Annie’s not hurt!”
“I know, buddy. I know.”
“Come get us!”
“I’m coming.”
Richard returned.
“You bring the drive. Alone.”
“Where?”
“I’ll send instructions.”
“Richard.”
“What?”
“If the boys come home, you still have a chance to walk into a police station.”
He laughed.
“You never understood me.”
“I understood you for twenty years.”
“No. You saw the version that made your life easier.”
The words stung because they were true.
“Why, Richard?”
“Why what?”
“The company. The money. Lauren.”
Silence.
Then bitterness.
“You really don’t know.”
“No.”
“I built Morrison Dynamics too.”
“I never said you didn’t.”
“But whose name went on the building?”
“This is about the name?”
“This is about twenty years of watching you become a visionary while I became the man who made your visions possible.”
“You owned twelve percent of a multibillion-dollar company.”
“I wanted control.”
“So you stole.”
“I took what I earned.”
“And killed people to protect it.”
His breathing changed.
“I didn’t kill those workers.”
“You covered their deaths.”
“I protected companies from lawsuits.”
“You killed Lauren.”
“She forced my hand.”
Annie flinched.
Walsh wrote rapidly.
We were recording everything.
“You ordered a truck driver to ram my car.”
“It was supposed to be you.”
My blood froze even though I already knew.
“You regret getting Lauren instead?”
For the first time, Richard sounded shaken.
“I regret that the children were there.”
Not Lauren.
The children.
That was his version of remorse.
“Where are they?”
“You’ll know soon.”
He disconnected.
Walsh immediately began issuing commands.
The call bounced through multiple towers.
No exact location.
But background audio had been recorded.
A train horn.
Industrial ventilation.
Something metallic striking at regular intervals.
Marcus played it repeatedly.
“I know that sound.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
“Freight couplings.”
“Alder?”
“Could be.”
There were four former Alder properties in the region.
Three already searched.
One remained.
An abandoned distribution warehouse near Peekskill.
Walsh mobilized teams.
Then a text arrived.
An address.
Not Peekskill.
A storage facility near Yonkers.
COME ALONE. 45 MINUTES. DRIVE OR BOYS DIE.
Walsh shook her head.
“Decoy.”
“Maybe.”
“You’re not going alone.”
“I’m going.”
“With a team.”
“He’ll see them.”
“We know what we’re doing.”
“So does he.”
Annie spoke.
“The boys may tell us where they are.”
Everyone looked at her.
“How?”
She grabbed my phone.
“When they get scared, I play a game.”
“What game?”
“Five things.”
I knew it.
Name five things you can see.
Four you can touch.
Three you can hear.
A grounding exercise.
“If Richard lets them talk again, ask.”
Walsh nodded.
At the storage facility, I followed instructions.
No obvious police vehicles.
No visible agents.
But they were everywhere.
My phone rang.
Richard.
“You came.”
“Where are you?”
“Put the drive in locker 318.”
I carried a duplicate drive created by investigators.
“You’ll release them?”
“When I know you didn’t bring police.”
“I need to hear them.”
“No.”
“Then no drive.”
Silence.
Richard swore.
Then Jordan’s voice came through.
“Daddy?”
“Jordan. Buddy, I need you to play Annie’s game.”
Annie listened from a concealed vehicle several blocks away.
Jordan sniffed.
“Five things?”
“Yes.”
Richard said something in the background.
I continued quickly.
“Five things you see.”
“Boxes.”
“What else?”
“Yellow door.”
“Good.”
“Big number fourteen.”
Marcus, listening remotely, immediately began searching warehouse layouts.
“What else?”
“Broken window.”
“Good.”
“Train picture.”
“And one more.”
Jordan whispered, “Mommy’s company.”
I froze.
“What?”
“The blue M.”
Morrison Dynamics.
Not Alder.
One of our facilities.
Marcus’s voice came through my hidden earpiece.
“Old North River prototype warehouse. Building fourteen has yellow interior doors and a rail mural.”
Twenty-two miles north.
Walsh was already moving teams.
I kept Jordan talking.
“What can you hear?”
“Train.”
“What else?”
“Water.”
The warehouse sat along the Hudson.
Confirmed.
“What else?”
Jordan suddenly screamed.
Richard grabbed the phone.
“Enough!”
The line died.
Walsh ordered the tactical unit toward North River.
I ignored the storage locker and ran for my car.
“Ethan!”
I drove.
Annie jumped into the passenger seat before I could stop her.
“What are you doing?”
“Going with you.”
“No.”
“Drive.”
“Annie—”
“Your sons trust me. If they panic, I may be able to get them to move when armed strangers can’t.”
She was right.
I hated that she was right.
We arrived behind the tactical convoy.
The North River warehouse had been abandoned five years earlier.
Four stories of steel, glass, rusted loading docks, and forgotten prototype equipment.
Police surrounded it quietly.
Thermal cameras detected three people inside.
Two small.
One adult.
Alive.
Walsh grabbed my arm.
“You stay here.”
“No.”
“You go inside and Caldwell gets leverage.”
“My children are already leverage.”
“You’re not trained.”
A gunshot echoed inside.
Annie gasped.
Every officer moved.
Then smoke began pouring from an upper window.
“He started a fire,” Marcus said.
My blood froze.
The tactical team entered.
I heard commands through radios.
Second floor clear.
Stairwell blocked.
Fire spreading from west corridor.
Then a child’s scream came over an officer’s microphone.
“Daddy!”
I ran.
Walsh shouted after me.
I didn’t stop.
Annie didn’t either.
Inside, smoke burned my eyes.
An officer tried to block us.
“Sir!”
“My children!”
“Second floor!”
We climbed.
Heat rolled downward.
At the top, Richard appeared through smoke.
He held Justin against him.
A pistol pressed to my son’s shoulder.
Jordan was nowhere in sight.
“Stop!”
I stopped.
Annie stopped behind me.
Justin was sobbing.
“Daddy.”
Richard looked almost unrecognizable.
Jacket gone.
Face gray.
Compass still on his wrist.
The shiny man.
“There he is,” Richard said.
“The great Ethan Morrison.”
“Give me Justin.”
“Where’s the drive?”
“Police have everything.”
His face twisted.
“You idiot.”
“You lost before you took them.”
“I can still hurt you.”
“You already did.”
Something changed in his eyes.
He pushed the gun closer to Justin.
Annie whispered, “Justin.”
Richard snapped toward her.
“Shut up.”
But Justin heard.
Annie lifted her hand.
Five fingers.
Their game.
Justin stared.
Four fingers.
Three.
His breathing slowed.
Richard didn’t notice.
I did.
Two fingers.
One.
Then Annie shouted, “Down!”
Justin dropped his entire body weight.
Richard’s arm jerked.
I lunged.
The gun fired.
The bullet struck metal overhead.
I hit Richard hard enough to drive both of us against the wall.
Justin crawled toward Annie.
Richard punched me.
I barely felt it.
Twenty years of friendship ended with my fist against the face of the man who had stood at my wedding.
Then police swarmed us.
Richard was dragged away.
I screamed only one thing.
“Jordan!”
Justin clung to Annie.
“Other room!”
Smoke thickened.
Firefighters were entering.
We ran.
At the end of the corridor, a steel door had jammed.
Behind it, Jordan was crying.
“Daddy!”
I grabbed the handle.
It wouldn’t move.
“Jordan!”
Flames crawled across the ceiling twenty feet away.
Annie found a metal bar.
Together we forced it between the door and frame.
“Again!” she screamed.
We pulled.
Nothing.
“Daddy!”
“I’m here!”
The flames came closer.
Annie looked at me.
“Together.”
We pulled one final time.
The lock tore free.
The door opened.
Jordan stood inside.
I grabbed him.
Then part of the burning ceiling collapsed.
I turned.
Annie shoved Jordan and me forward.
A beam struck her.
She disappeared beneath smoke.
“ANNIE!”
Jordan screamed.
I handed him to a firefighter and turned back.
The ceiling above us groaned.
Someone grabbed me.
I fought them.
“Annie’s in there!”
Through the smoke, I saw one gray sleeve beneath the fallen beam.
May you like
And for one horrible second, fourteen months after losing Lauren, I knew exactly what my sons had felt.
Someone they trusted had disappeared behind a wall of fire.
