Chapter 16 - BECAUSE DEAD THINGS DON'T TRY
The abandoned rehabilitation hospital in Joliet had been closed for nine years.
Its windows were boarded.
Its name had been removed from the brick entrance, leaving only pale rectangular scars where letters used to be.
Rafe's team arrived without local police.
Federal agents came from Chicago under Marcus Hale's coordination.
Elena went with them.
Luca remained at the estate with Dr. Shah, Danielle, Tommy, and a bank of live feeds that made distance feel like a punishment.
Rafe's body camera showed the entrance opening under a hydraulic spreader.
The lobby beyond was dark.
Dust covered the floor except for fresh tire tracks from a cart.
"Movement rear corridor," an agent whispered.
The team split.
Elena was kept behind the second line despite arguing.
Luca heard every breath through the secure audio.
The first room contained empty pharmacy shelves.
The second contained hospital beds stacked on their sides.
The third contained a metal cabinet with Bellweather inventory tags.
Rafe opened it.
Inside were old ampoules of the nerve-suppressing compound.
Some were expired by more than a decade.
Some had recent labels.
Luca stared at the screen.
"Keane kept producing it."
Dr. Shah leaned closer.
"Or someone did."
Rafe moved deeper into the building.
A sound came from the floor above.
Footsteps.
Then something metal fell.
The team climbed.
At the end of the second-floor hall, they found Maya's dance bag.
Blue ribbons had been torn from the handle.
Elena pushed past an agent.
"That's hers."
Rafe caught her arm.
"Stay behind me."
She yanked free.
"Find my daughter."
The next room had been used recently.
Bottled water.
Two folding chairs.
A portable heater.
Fast-food wrappers.
No Maya.
On one chair sat a baseball.
Tommy saw it through the feed from the estate.
"That's ours."
Luca looked at him.
"How do you know?"
"Blue marker."
Tommy pointed at the monitor.
"We put a dot on the balls that roll into the lake because Maya says they come back meaner."
Luca almost asked what that meant.
There was no time.
Rafe picked up the ball.
Something was written on it in pencil.
Not enough light.
He moved to the window.
Three letters became visible.
TRY.
Luca stared.
Dr. Shah looked at him.
"That for you?"
He knew immediately.
Maya's first explanation on the porch returned with exact clarity.
Because dead things don't try.
Luca looked at Tommy.
"She left it for us."
Tommy nodded hard.
"She makes clues."
"What does TRY mean?"
"Maybe not just try."
Tommy took the printed floor plan from Danielle.
He stared at it.
"Maya doesn't write words when she can make initials."
"Initials for what?"
"I don't know."
He looked again.
T.
R.
Y.
Three letters.
Three places.
"Terminal?" Danielle said.
Luca's attention sharpened.
T for Terminal 14.
R for rehabilitation hospital.
Y.
"What's Y?" Elena asked through the audio.
Nobody knew.
Rafe searched the room.
Under the baseball chair was a piece of paper torn from Maya's math notebook.
Three columns of numbers.
4-1-18-4.
25-1-18-4.
Tommy stared.
"That's code."
Danielle asked, "What code?"
"Letters."
"A is one."
"B is two."
He worked it out aloud.
"Four is D."
"One A."
"Eighteen R."
"Four D."
DARD.
"Wrong," Tommy said.
He switched the first number.
Then Maya's habit clicked for him.
"She reverses when she thinks adults might read it."
He read backward.
4-18-1-4.
D-R-A-D.
"Drad?"
Luca looked at the page.
"Maybe she was rushed."
Tommy shook his head.
"No."
"Maya spells right when she's scared."
"She gets more careful."
The second group reversed became D-R-A-Y.
Danielle frowned.
Luca looked at the old map pinned beside the monitor.
Then he saw it.
Drydock.
"Dry yard," he said.
Rafe heard him.
"What?"
"My grandfather called the maintenance parcel behind Terminal 14 the dry yard."
"It was where they stored empty containers and repaired chassis."
Danielle pulled the property map.
A narrow strip of land behind Terminal 14 was labeled YARD D.
Y.
Maya had not been naming a new city.
She was pointing back to the same place everyone believed had already been searched.
"They moved her from the hospital back to Terminal 14," Luca said.
"Why?" Elena asked.
"Because agents cleared the warehouse."
"Once law enforcement left, it became safer than before."
Rafe was already turning around.
Federal agents raced back toward Chicago.
Luca looked at the live highway map.
Forty-three minutes minimum.
Too long.
He called Matteo.
No answer.
He called again.
No answer.
Third time.
Matteo picked up.
"What?"
"Terminal 14."
Silence.
"Dry yard."
Another silence.
Matteo's voice changed.
"How do you know?"
"Maya."
"She's there?"
"I think so."
"My people can get there in twelve minutes."
Luca looked at Elena's feed.
He had promised not to release the monsters.
Now one was offering help.
"No guns inside unless necessary."
Matteo laughed once.
"You think this is the time for policy?"
"I think my daughter is inside."
"Then twelve minutes."
"Matteo."
"What?"
"If this is a trap—"
"Then kill me later."
The line went dead.
Elena heard enough through Rafe's channel to understand.
"You called him."
"Yes."
"After what I said."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because he can get there first."
Elena's face filled the small monitor.
Fear.
Anger.
Acceptance.
"No shooting near Maya."
"I told him."
"Tell him again."
Luca did.
At the estate, Dr. Shah tried to make him eat.
He refused.
She put a protein bar on the desk anyway.
"You faint, you become useless to everybody."
Luca looked at her.
The word should have hurt.
It did not this time.
He opened the wrapper.
Twelve minutes later, Matteo's men reached Terminal 14.
They did not enter.
Matteo called.
"There's a van in the dry yard."
"Florist?"
"Yes."
"Movement?"
"Two men visible."
"No sign of Maya."
"Wait for Rafe."
"That's what I'm doing."
Luca blinked.
"You listened."
"Enjoy it."
Rafe's convoy arrived nine minutes later.
Federal agents were still seven minutes out.
Rafe and Matteo's men formed a perimeter.
Elena stayed in the armored vehicle because Rafe threatened to handcuff her to it.
This time she believed him.
Rafe entered the dry yard through a side gate.
The camera feed shook as he moved between stacked containers.
A voice shouted.
A man ran.
Rafe's team took him down without a shot.
Second man surrendered near the van.
Owen Mercer was not among them.
Neither was Keane.
Rafe reached an old maintenance shed.
The door was locked from outside.
He cut it.
Inside, Maya sat on a chair with her hands taped in front of her.
She was awake.
She was furious.
"You took forever," she said.
Elena sobbed over the open channel.
Luca could not speak.
Rafe crouched and removed the tape.
"Are you hurt?"
"No."
"Did anyone touch you?"
"They grabbed me."
"Anything else?"
"No."
"Who was here?"
Maya looked at the doorway.
"The doctor."
"Keane?"
"The old one from Luca's house."
"Anyone else?"
"The lawyer-shoes man."
"Owen?"
"I don't know his name."
Rafe showed her a photo.
Maya nodded.
"Him."
"Anyone else?"
Maya's face changed.
"Matteo came."
The entire channel went silent.
Luca gripped the desk.
"What did he do?" Rafe asked.
Maya looked toward the camera as if she knew Luca was watching.
"He yelled at them."
Luca stared.
"What did he say?"
"He said they were idiots."
"He said I was never supposed to be here."
Rafe's eyes narrowed.
"Then what?"
"The doctor said it was the only way to make Luca stop."
"Matteo said, 'You don't use a kid to fix a business problem.'"
Luca closed his eyes.
Everything shifted again.
"Did Matteo leave you here?" Rafe asked.
"He told them to let me go."
"Then somebody called him."
"He went outside."
"After that, the lawyer-shoes man got scared."
"They moved me into this room."
"Then they left."
Rafe stood.
"Where is Matteo now?"
Maya shook her head.
"I don't know."
"Did you hear anything else?"
Maya thought.
"They talked about the boxes."
"What boxes?"
"The papers."
"The doctor said they couldn't burn them until somebody signed."
"Who?"
Maya looked at the camera again.
"Luca."
Luca felt cold.
The archive had not been destroyed because it required his authorization after Maya's paternity recognition.
The kidnappers had not taken Maya only to threaten him emotionally.
They needed his signature.
Maya added one more thing.
"And Matteo said if Luca signs, he'll lose everything."
Luca stared at the screen.
May you like
For the first time, Matteo had tried to stop the people supposedly working for him.
And for the first time, Luca had evidence that someone else still had a plan requiring Luca to choose between Maya and his empire.
