CHAPTER 29 THE RIVER MESSAGE
Ortiz ordered an immediate sweep of the residence.
No transmitter was found.
The baby monitor was not connected to the internet.
Someone had accessed it through a local signal.
They were close.
Federal agents searched every house within three blocks.
Nothing.
Rachel’s message repeated one hour later.
This time, she gave coordinates.
A section of the Columbia River near an abandoned ferry terminal.
“Could be a trap,” Ortiz said.
“It is a trap,” Claire replied.
“But Rachel has Thomas and Nora.”
“We don’t know that.”
“We saw them together.”
Ortiz arranged a tactical team.
Grace remained at the secure residence with two federal agents and a pediatric nurse.
Claire kissed her forehead.
“I will be back before you wake up.”
The abandoned terminal stood beneath a bridge.
Rain fell over the river.
A single light glowed inside the building.
Ortiz entered first.
Claire and I followed behind the tactical team.
A projector activated on the far wall.
Rachel appeared on the screen.
She sat in a plain white room.
The scar across her forehead matched Nora’s description.
“My brother,” she said.
Hearing her address me broke something inside my chest.
“I am sorry you had to learn this way.”
“Where are Thomas and Nora?” I demanded.
“They are alive.”
“Let us see them.”
“I cannot.”
“Are you working with Arthur?”
Rachel looked away.
“Arthur Vale gave me a choice after the fire. Cooperate or watch Diane destroy everyone I loved.”
“So you joined him?”
“I survived him.”
The distinction sounded important to her.
It was not enough for me.
“Why did you send Nora to Rachel House?”
“Because her pregnancy activated the final stage of the trust.”
“What does that have to do with Grace?”
Rachel leaned closer to the camera.
“Grace and Nora’s baby are the only living heirs who can unlock the complete Bennett-Rose estate.”
“Forty-eight million dollars?”
Rachel shook her head.
“The visible trust is forty-eight million.”
“What is the complete estate?”
“More than six billion.”
Claire inhaled sharply.
Arthur Vale had built his network to gain control of the estate through successive generations.
Pregnant women were not only victims.
They were legal gateways.
“Who is my biological father?” I asked.
Rachel stared at me.
“Arthur.”
The room seemed to tilt.
“Arthur Vale is our father?”
“He is yours.”
“But not yours?”
Rachel’s eyes filled with pain.
“Thomas is my biological father.”
Diane and Arthur had used Evelyn to produce children from different fathers, creating competing inheritance lines.
Rachel was Thomas’s daughter.
I was Arthur’s son.
Nora was our half sister through Evelyn.
Grace was Arthur’s granddaughter.
“You are the central beneficiary,” Rachel said. “That is why Claire was chosen for you.”
Claire stepped toward the screen.
“Did you choose me?”
Rachel did not answer immediately.
“Yes.”
My wife recoiled.
“I reviewed your file,” Rachel continued. “I believed you would protect him.”
“You manipulated our lives.”
“I kept him alive.”
“You don’t get to call that protection.”
Rachel looked toward someone outside the camera frame.
“We are almost out of time.”
“Where is Thomas?”
“With Evelyn.”
“Where?”
Rachel’s voice lowered.
“Evelyn is not a prisoner. She is the only person Arthur fears.”
The projector image flickered.
A second figure entered Rachel’s room.
A tall older man.
Arthur Vale.
He placed one hand on her shoulder.
Rachel did not pull away.
“Tell them,” he said.
Rachel closed her eyes.
“I am sorry.”
Arthur smiled into the camera.
“You brought the wrong child to the secure residence.”
The screen went black.
Ortiz grabbed her phone.
No one at the residence answered.
We ran for the vehicles.
Halfway to the door, Claire stopped.
On the wet floor beneath the projector lay Grace’s wooden rabbit.
The same toy found in Thomas’s apartment.
Tied around its neck was a hospital identification band.
May you like
The name printed on it was not Grace Bennett.
It was Grace Vale.
