Chapter 7 - Emily’s Call
I answered immediately.
“Emily?”
For three seconds, I heard only breathing.
Then her voice came through.
“Daniel.”
My knees nearly gave way.
“Where are you?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“Are you hurt?”
“Yes.”
“Who has you?”
She began crying silently.
I knew the sound because I had heard it once before, after her father’s funeral.
She cried that way when she was trying not to be found.
“Is Owen with you?”
The breathing changed.
A man’s voice spoke in the distance.
Emily whispered quickly.
“Noah is yours.”
“The tests were designed to confuse you.”
“They need his blood because your father hid access inside his genetic record.”
“What access?”
“I don’t know everything.”
“Emily, tell me where you are.”
“Find Lila.”
“Lila is dead.”
Silence.
Then Emily made a broken sound.
“No.”
“Her body was taken.”
“She was helping you?”
“She switched identities with me.”
“Why?”
“To get evidence out.”
“Daniel, your mother is not in charge.”
“She thinks she is.”
“Who is?”
The line crackled.
Emily spoke faster.
“Caleb found something your father left in the military insurance file.”
“He went to Owen.”
“Owen went to Sheriff Crane.”
“They built the plan together.”
“Your mother joined because she wanted the estate.”
“But Caleb wanted something else.”
I looked across the room.
Caleb stood between two agents.
His face had gone white.
“What did Caleb want?”
Emily’s next sentence was almost inaudible.
“He wanted your life.”
The call ended.
Elena immediately began tracing it.
The signal had bounced through three states.
Its final tower location placed the phone near a rural airfield owned by Meridian Family Holdings.
Caleb began demanding an attorney.
I moved toward him.
Elena stepped between us.
“Don’t give him anything he can use against you.”
“He has my wife.”
“Then we make him lead us to her.”
Caleb looked at me through Elena’s shoulder.
“You always had everything.”
“Dad’s respect.”
“The military career.”
“Emily.”
“She was never yours.”
“She chose me.”
“After I introduced you.”
“You told me she thought you were unstable.”
His words exposed an old lie.
Years earlier, Caleb had claimed Emily rejected him after a single date.
Emily later told me they had never dated.
He had introduced us at a charity dinner and then resented every conversation that followed.
“You created the fake tests,” I said.
“I created questions.”
“Questions destroy people more effectively than bullets.”
Mother turned toward him.
“What did you do?”
Caleb smiled at her.
“The same thing you did.”
“I stopped waiting for Daniel to give me what should have been mine.”
Elena’s technician interrupted.
“The airfield camera just came online.”
A live image appeared.
A private jet sat on the runway.
Emily was being led toward it.
The man holding her arm wore a medical coat.
Dr. Owen Mercer.
Behind them walked Sheriff Crane.
Caleb looked at the screen and smiled.
May you like
“You have twelve minutes before that plane leaves.”
“Unfortunately, the only person with the gate code is me.”
