Chapter 1 - BLOOD IN THE PINES
Norah reached Gabriel just before his knees gave out.
His weight nearly dragged both of them into the wet leaves.
“Gabriel.”
“I told you to keep running.”
“And leave you bleeding in the woods?”
“That was the instruction.”
“Terrible instruction.”
Even wounded, his mouth almost curved.
Almost.
Then another sound came through the trees.
An engine.
Norah froze.
Gabriel immediately pulled her behind a thick pine trunk and raised his gun.
Headlights appeared through the fog.
For several terrible seconds, neither of them moved.
Then the vehicle stopped.
A man stepped out.
Gabriel’s finger tightened against the trigger.
“Boss?”
Gabriel lowered the weapon slightly.
“Mateo.”
Mateo Alvarez had been Gabriel’s driver for eleven years.
He was broad-shouldered, gray at the temples, and usually impossible to surprise.
Tonight, his expression changed when he saw the blood on Gabriel’s shirt.
“What happened?”
“Safe house was burned.”
Mateo looked toward Norah.
“How?”
“That,” Gabriel said, “is what we’re going to find out.”
They moved quickly.
Inside the SUV, Norah tore open the emergency medical kit.
The bullet had passed through the upper part of Gabriel’s side.
There was a lot of blood, but not enough to make her think the wound was immediately fatal.
Gabriel watched her hands.
“You’ve done this before?”
“My father owned a machine shop.”
“That doesn’t explain knowing how to stop bleeding.”
“He also thought health insurance was a conspiracy.”
Gabriel actually smiled that time.
Then his face hardened again.
“Tell me everything you remember about the Delaware company.”
Norah pressed gauze against the wound.
“Created three days after Declan’s promotion.”
“Registered agent?”
“Franklin Corporate Services.”
“Owner?”
“Hidden behind two shell entities.”
“Bank?”
“Mercer Atlantic.”
Gabriel’s eyes changed.
Norah noticed.
“You know it.”
“My organization stopped using Mercer Atlantic seven years ago.”
“Why?”
“Because somebody there sold private banking information to federal investigators.”
Norah stared at him.
“Then why would someone inside your organization use it?”
Gabriel looked through the dark window.
“To make certain I noticed.”
That answer disturbed her more than the attack.
They reached another property forty minutes later.
It was not a mansion.
It was an abandoned veterinary clinic outside the city that Gabriel apparently owned through three different companies.
Mateo locked the doors.
Gabriel refused a hospital.
Norah stopped arguing after he reminded her that whoever had found the safe house might also know which doctors worked for him.
She cleaned the wound while Mateo contacted only two men.
No one else.
At 5:17 a.m., Norah reopened her laptop.
Gabriel glared at her from the examination table.
“You haven’t slept.”
“Neither have you.”
“I was shot.”
“That sounds like a personal problem.”
Mateo coughed to hide a laugh.
Norah pulled up the invoices again.
She compared timestamps.
Vendor numbers.
Authorization logs.
Then she noticed something.
The fourteen-percent inflation was not simply consistent.
It occurred exactly eleven minutes after one specific person approved each legitimate invoice.
Every time.
She filtered the authorization code.
Her stomach dropped.
“What?”
Gabriel was watching her.
Norah slowly turned the laptop.
“The approval credential belongs to Mateo.”
Silence filled the room.
Mateo stared at the screen.
Then at Gabriel.
“I didn’t approve those.”
Gabriel reached for his gun.
Norah immediately shook her head.
“Wait.”
Gabriel did not lower it.
She zoomed into the records.
“Someone copied his credential.”
Mateo remained perfectly still.
Norah opened one final column.
“And whoever did it wanted us to discover that.”
Gabriel looked at the number displayed beside Mateo’s authorization code.
It was not fourteen percent.
It was a message hidden inside the transaction sequence.
14-11-03.
Gabriel went pale.
Norah noticed.
“What does that mean?”
Gabriel stared at the numbers.
Then he said quietly.
May you like
“It’s the date my father was murdered.”
And for the first time since Norah had known him, Gabriel looked afraid.
