Chapter 3 - THE EMPTY OFFICE
Emma called Noah five times.
No answer.
She called building security and identified herself as chief compliance officer.
The guard who answered sounded nervous.
“Everything is fine, Mrs. Vale.”
“My assistant may be in danger.”
“We checked your floor. No one is there.”
“Then where is Noah Bennett?”
“I’m not authorized to discuss employee locations.”
“I am his supervisor.”
“I’m sorry. You’ll need to speak with Mr. Vale.”
The guard disconnected.
Emma stood in the terminal with Ortiz’s evidence pressed against her side.
Richard controlled the building.
He controlled security.
He might also control the police officers who would respond if she reported Noah missing.
She called the one person Richard did not know she still trusted.
Lena Cho answered immediately.
“Emma?”
Lena had been Daniel Mercer’s corporate attorney. After his death, Richard replaced her with Vale Meridian’s legal team. She now operated a small practice in New Haven.
“I need your help.”
“Where are you?”
“Union Terminal.”
“Are you safe?”
“I don’t know.”
“Go to the café across from the east entrance. Sit where you can see both doors. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
Lena arrived in eighteen.
She wore jeans beneath a long coat and carried a leather briefcase. The moment she saw Emma’s face, she stopped asking casual questions.
They took a corner table.
Emma placed the photograph, flash drive, recorder, and laboratory documents between them.
Lena read the original brake report twice.
“Where did you get this?”
“Detective Ortiz.”
“Does Richard know?”
“I think so.”
Lena examined the photograph of Richard beside Daniel’s car.
“This alone doesn’t prove he touched the brakes.”
“I know.”
“But combined with the suppressed report, it gives us enough to demand the case be reopened.”
“Not if the same people still control the investigation.”
Lena inserted the flash drive into an offline laptop.
The first folder contained photographs from Daniel’s crash scene.
The second contained scanned financial records.
The third was labeled LANTERN.
Inside were copies of invoices from Mercer Industrial dated before Daniel’s death. The documents appeared to show large purchases of raw materials that had never been delivered. The payments had gone to companies later acquired by Vale Meridian.
Lena leaned closer to the screen.
“These invoices were used to drain your father’s company.”
“Richard claimed Mercer Industrial was nearly bankrupt.”
“It was made to look bankrupt.”
Emma opened another file.
A list of initials appeared beside payment amounts.
R.V.
M.V.
C.H.
S.O.
Next to R.V. was a payment of two million dollars.
Next to S.O. was a payment of one hundred thousand.
Emma looked at Lena.
“Samuel Ortiz?”
Lena’s expression hardened.
“Possibly.”
Emma felt ill.
Ortiz had given her the evidence. But the list suggested he might have been paid.
“Maybe he took money and changed his mind.”
“Or maybe the locker is a trap.”
Emma immediately removed the flash drive.
Her phone vibrated again.
This time it was a message from an unknown number.
NOAH IS SAFE FOR NOW.
A photograph followed.
Noah sat in a metal chair inside what appeared to be an empty warehouse. His wrists were bound, but he was conscious.
Beneath the image was a demand.
BRING THE LOCKER CONTENTS TO MERCER FACTORY AT MIDNIGHT.
COME ALONE.
Lena read the message.
“You’re not going.”
“They have Noah.”
“They may kill both of you.”
“They’ll hurt him if I don’t.”
“They may hurt him regardless.”
Emma studied the photograph.
Noah’s jacket was torn. Blood marked the corner of his mouth. Behind him, a yellow safety sign hung on a concrete pillar.
Emma enlarged the image.
The sign bore part of an old logo.
MERCER INDUSTRIAL.
“They’re already at the factory,” she said.
The original Mercer plant had been closed after Vale Meridian acquired the company. Richard claimed the property was unsafe and scheduled it for demolition.
Demolition was supposed to begin in three days.
Lena reached for her phone.
“I know a federal prosecutor. Her name is Maya Brooks. We worked together on a procurement case.”
“Can we trust her?”
“I trust her more than anyone connected to Bellweather.”
Lena made the call.
While she explained the situation, Emma listened to the digital recorder from Ortiz’s locker.
Daniel’s voice filled the headphones.
He sounded tired.
“Detective Ortiz, this is Daniel Mercer. I found the duplicate accounts. The money isn’t being stolen from my company. Someone is moving it through my company to hide where it came from.”
A pause.
“If anything happens to me, ask Emma about the blue house.”
The recording ended.
Emma played it again.
Ask Emma about the blue house.
She had no idea what it meant.
There had never been a blue house in their family.
Lena ended her call.
“Maya wants us at the federal building now.”
Emma shook her head.
“Noah may not have until morning.”
“Maya can mobilize agents.”
“How quickly?”
Lena hesitated.
“That depends on authorization.”
“They told me midnight.”
“It’s ten forty.”
Emma looked again at Noah’s photograph.
Then she noticed something reflected in the metal leg of the chair.
A digital clock.
The display read 7:16.
The photograph had not been taken recently.
Noah might no longer be at the factory.
Or he might already be dead.
Emma’s phone rang.
Noah’s number appeared.
She answered immediately.
“Emma?”
His voice was weak.
“Noah, where are you?”
“I don’t know. They moved me.”
“Who took you?”
A breath.
Then Noah whispered, “Your father’s partner.”
The call ended.
Emma lowered the phone.
Lena stared at her.
“Your father didn’t have a partner.”
Emma slowly looked toward the files on the laptop.
“Yes,” she said. “He did.”
There had been one man who helped Daniel establish Mercer Industrial twenty-seven years earlier.
A man who disappeared from company records before Emma was born.
A man Daniel had forbidden anyone to discuss.
May you like
His own younger brother.
Thomas Mercer.
