Chapter 11: Daniel’s Offer
Daniel contacted Ryan the next morning.
His voice was relaxed.
Almost friendly.
“I’m disappointed you involved the police,” he said.
“You tried to burn my wife alive.”
“The fire was never meant to spread that quickly.”
Ryan recorded the call from Detective Ortiz’s office.
“Where is my father’s tape?”
“Safe.”
“What do you want?”
“An exchange.”
Daniel wanted the original financial ledger and written immunity from Ryan regarding all internal company crimes.
In return, he would surrender the tape and testify that Evelyn alone had planned the nursery incident.
“You expect me to believe you?” Ryan asked.
“I expect you to understand your priorities.”
“My priority is my family.”
“Then protect it. The ledger will destroy the company. The tape will destroy your mother. Choose the cleaner tragedy.”
Ryan looked through the observation window.
Maya stood beside Ortiz, listening.
“Where do we meet?”
Daniel named a hotel owned by Whitmore Holdings.
The presidential suite had a private elevator and no hallway cameras.
Ortiz prepared a false ledger.
Ryan entered the suite alone while officers waited below.
Daniel stood near the window.
He looked older than Ryan remembered.
His suit was wrinkled.
His eyes had the sleepless look of a hunted man.
“The ledger,” Daniel said.
“The tape.”
Daniel placed the cassette on a table.
Ryan placed the false ledger beside it.
Neither man moved.
“Did you kill my father?” Ryan asked.
Daniel’s expression barely changed.
“Your father killed himself with righteousness.”
“That is not an answer.”
“He was going to destroy everything over bookkeeping.”
“He was dying on the floor.”
Daniel looked toward the city.
“Evelyn believed the company needed time. She asked me to remove the documents. She did not tell me to hurt him.”
“But you stopped Beth from calling for help.”
“I made a choice.”
Ryan’s hidden microphone captured every word.
Then Daniel noticed a faint reflection in the window.
A red light beneath Ryan’s shirt.
He lunged across the table.
The two men crashed into a glass cabinet.
The cassette slid across the floor.
Daniel pulled a knife.
Ryan blocked his wrist and drove him into the wall.
The elevator doors opened.
Police entered with weapons drawn.
Daniel grabbed the cassette and ran toward the balcony.
He climbed over the railing to a maintenance platform.
Rain made the metal slick.
Ryan followed despite Ortiz’s warning.
Daniel reached the next balcony.
Then the railing beneath him broke.
Ryan caught his wrist.
For one suspended moment, Daniel hung thirty stories above the street.
“Give me the tape,” Ryan said.
Daniel laughed breathlessly.
“You are still your mother’s son.”
He released the cassette.
It fell into the darkness.
Then Daniel tried to pull Ryan over the edge.
Ryan lost his grip.
Daniel fell.
May you like
The river below swallowed him.
His body was never recovered.
