Chapter 6 - The Price of SilenceDaniel stepped into view.
Peter Voss did not look surprised.
“Mr. Mercer.”
“Take your hand out of your coat.”
Voss slowly lifted both hands.
“I’m not armed.”
“I didn’t ask.”
Voss removed his hand.
Empty.
Maya remained behind Daniel.
“Who sent you?”
Voss smiled.
“You already know.”
“Say it.”
“No.”
Daniel moved closer.
“You kept my mother here.”
“I delivered medication.”
“You imprisoned her.”
“I never locked the door.”
Daniel glanced at the cottage door.
“An elderly woman who was drugged, isolated, and told her son hated her didn’t need a lock.”
For the first time, Voss’s smile faded.
“You think this is simple.”
“Make it complicated.”
Voss looked at Maya.
“She should leave.”
“She stays.”
“That’s your first mistake.”
Daniel grabbed his coat and pushed him against the wall.
Voss could have resisted.
He did not.
“Tell me why my mother was declared dead.”
Voss’s voice remained level.
“Because dead people cannot vote.”
Daniel tightened his grip.
“And because dead people don’t ask where ninety-six million dollars went.”
Daniel froze.
Ninety-six.
Evelyn’s notebook had mentioned eighteen million.
The theft was far larger.
“Stonebridge?”
Voss said nothing.
Daniel released him.
“Who else?”
Voss adjusted his coat.
“I’m not suicidal.”
“Then cooperate.”
“You can’t protect me.”
“I can.”
“No, you can protect me from police.”
Voss looked toward the mill.
“You cannot protect me from Mercer Industries.”
Daniel almost laughed.
“I am Mercer Industries.”
Voss looked at him with something close to pity.
“That is what your uncle trained you to believe.”
He walked toward the door.
Daniel blocked him.
“You’re not leaving.”
Voss stopped.
“You want the truth?”
“Yes.”
“Ask your mother why Graham was still on the board eighteen months ago.”
Daniel’s anger shifted.
“What?”
“She knew what he was doing long before she disappeared.”
Daniel remembered Evelyn’s notebook.
If Daniel learns what his uncle has done, it will destroy him.
“Explain.”
Voss shook his head.
“That belongs to her.”
Maya spoke for the first time.
“You threatened me.”
Voss looked at her.
“Yes.”
“You left that photograph.”
“No.”
Daniel and Maya both stared.
Voss continued.
“I offered you money. I warned you away. I never entered your room.”
“Who did?”
“Someone who has access to the mansion.”
Daniel thought of Graham’s midnight visit.
Voss looked at Maya’s beige bag.
“You were smarter than we thought.”
“What does that mean?”
“The bread.”
Maya stiffened.
“We tracked grocery deliveries. Pharmacy purchases. Cash withdrawals.”
Daniel felt disgust.
“You monitored her?”
“We monitored the cottage.”
“But bread from my kitchen didn’t create a transaction.”
“No.”
Maya had accidentally defeated a multimillion-dollar surveillance system with leftovers.
Voss stepped closer to Daniel.
“If I were you, I’d stop asking who kidnapped your mother.”
Daniel frowned.
“That seems like the first question.”
“It isn’t.”
“What is?”
“Who benefited from her death besides Graham?”
Before Daniel could answer, Voss shoved him aside and ran.
Daniel pursued him outside.
Voss crossed the road toward the mill.
A motorcycle roared from behind the building.
Voss mounted it.
By the time Daniel reached the road, he was gone.
Maya came running.
“Why didn’t he hurt us?”
Daniel stared after the motorcycle.
“Because he wanted me to hear something.”
“Could be manipulation.”
“Yes.”
“Do you believe him?”
Daniel thought of his mother.
“I believe he was afraid.”
That evening Daniel visited Evelyn.
She sat beside Sarah’s fireplace wrapped in a blanket.
A plate of food rested untouched on the table.
Daniel placed her notebook beside it.
Evelyn looked at the cover.
Her face changed.
“You searched my room.”
“I found what you wanted hidden.”
“I never wanted you to see that.”
“Why?”
Silence.
Daniel sat across from her.
“Peter Voss says ninety-six million dollars disappeared.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
“So it was him.”
“He also says you knew.”
“I knew some.”
“How much?”
“Not ninety-six.”
“How much?”
“Twenty-two million.”
Daniel stared.
“You knew Graham stole twenty-two million dollars?”
“I suspected.”
“You kept him as chairman.”
“He was your uncle.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“He was your father’s brother.”
“Still not an answer.”
Evelyn looked at him.
“Charles asked me to protect the family.”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“By protecting the thief?”
“I thought Graham would stop.”
“You thought someone stealing millions would develop a conscience?”
“He had gambling debts. Bad investments. Charles covered them twice.”
Daniel stood.
“My father knew?”
“Yes.”
Daniel walked away.
Suddenly his father’s old warnings made sense.
Never let loyalty replace oversight.
Daniel had assumed they were business lessons.
They were family confessions.
“You all lied to me.”
Evelyn began crying.
“We wanted you to build your life without carrying our mistakes.”
“You let Graham remain powerful.”
“Yes.”
“And he used that power against you.”
“Yes.”
“And me.”
“Yes.”
Daniel faced her.
“Why didn’t you tell me when you found the Stonebridge transfers?”
“Because I was ashamed.”
“Of Graham?”
“Of myself.”
She looked older than seventy-two.
“I protected him for years. Every time I hid what he had done, I taught him there would never be consequences.”
Daniel’s anger softened but did not disappear.
“What happened when you finally confronted him?”
Evelyn stared into the fire.
“I told him I would remove him from the trust.”
“And?”
“He asked me for forty-eight hours.”
“What happened after forty-eight hours?”
“I got pneumonia.”
Daniel went still.
“That can happen naturally.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
Evelyn looked at him.
“My regular medication was changed three days before I became sick.”
Daniel felt the room narrow.
“By whom?”
“I don’t know.”
She reached for the bread Maya had brought earlier.
Her hands trembled.
Then she whispered, “There is something else.”
Daniel waited.
Evelyn looked directly at him.
“The night before they moved me from Laurel Crest, Graham visited.”
“What did he say?”
“He said you had agreed to the Halcyon merger.”
“I hadn’t.”
“I told him I would call you.”
“And?”
“He laughed.”
Evelyn’s eyes filled.
“He said, ‘Daniel signs whatever we put in front of him.’”
Daniel thought of the forged healthcare authorization.
His digital certificate.
Someone inside his inner circle.
The conspiracy required access Graham did not personally have.
Daniel asked slowly, “Who managed my electronic signature while I was in Singapore?”
He already knew the answer.
Evelyn did not.
But Daniel did.
His chief of staff.
May you like
His closest friend since business school.
Nathan Cole.
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