Chapter 6 - The Housekeeper Who Vanished)
Daniel dropped beside Vale.
“Where were you hit?”
Vale pressed one hand to his side.
“Not fatal.”
Daniel looked toward Warren.
“Find Noah.”
Warren was already moving.
Daniel shouted for security.
No answer.
The villa’s internal communication system was dead.
He grabbed Vale beneath the arm and dragged him behind the desk.
“Stay down.”
“You need the envelope.”
Daniel reached for it.
Gone.
He looked toward the open office door.
Anna had been standing nearest the desk.
“Anna.”
Vale shook his head.
“You don’t know that.”
“She disappeared with the envelope.”
“Or someone took her.”
Another crash came from upstairs.
Daniel ran.
The corridor was empty.
The nursery door stood open.
Noah’s bed was empty.
For half a second Daniel’s heart stopped.
Then Warren stepped from the adjoining dressing room carrying the boy.
“Safe.”
Daniel nearly collapsed.
“Where?”
“Closet. Anna put him there.”
Daniel stared.
“What?”
Warren pointed.
A blanket had been placed around Noah.
Beside him had been a handwritten note.
Daniel unfolded it.
I heard them coming.
I hid Noah.
I’m sorry.
A.B.
“She didn’t take him,” Warren said.
“Where is she?”
“We don’t know.”
The power returned.
Security radios began chirping.
One guard reported finding another unconscious near the basement.
A second had been locked inside the monitoring room.
The intruder had known the layout.
Known the power system.
Known the blind zones.
Daniel looked at Warren.
“You’re on my father’s list.”
Warren’s face became rigid.
“What list?”
Daniel told him.
Warren listened without interrupting.
When Daniel finished, he removed his weapon and placed it on the floor.
“What are you doing?”
“Making this easy.”
“For whom?”
“For you.”
Warren stepped back.
“If you think I’m compromised, treat me like I’m compromised.”
Daniel studied him.
“That could be exactly what a compromised man would say.”
“It could.”
“Why did your father work at Bellhaven?”
“He was maintenance supervisor.”
“Did he know what happened there?”
“He died when I was seventeen. I never asked.”
“Convenient.”
Warren’s jaw tightened.
“Daniel, I have protected your family for twelve years.”
“And my wife escaped through a bathroom window.”
“Yes.”
“My son was attacked upstairs.”
“Yes.”
“And someone disabled every system you are paid to control.”
“Yes.”
Warren met his eyes.
“If you want to fire me, do it after we find Anna.”
Daniel heard the sincerity.
Or wanted to.
He hated not knowing the difference.
Vale was taken to a private medical room.
The bullet had passed through soft tissue.
He would survive.
Daniel moved Noah to a secure guest suite with Dr. Hale and two guards he personally trusted.
Then he went to the basement.
A side exit had been forced open.
Outside, rain had begun.
Footprints crossed the gravel.
Two sets.
One belonged to Anna’s small shoes.
The other was larger.
Male.
“She was taken,” Daniel said.
Warren crouched.
“Looks that way.”
Daniel’s phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
A photograph appeared.
Anna was tied to a chair.
Blood at her lip.
Behind her was a grey concrete wall.
A message followed.
Bring the key.
Come alone.
Daniel stared.
Then another message.
You have two hours.
Warren read over his shoulder.
“They think you have it.”
“I don’t.”
“They don’t know that.”
Daniel looked at the photograph.
“Can you locate the phone?”
“Probably burner. We’ll try.”
Daniel zoomed in on the image.
Behind Anna was a faded blue symbol.
A circle split by three vertical lines.
Vale had mentioned nothing about a symbol.
But Daniel remembered seeing it before.
On the Bellhaven photograph.
Stamped faintly near the entrance.
“Warren.”
He showed him.
Warren’s face changed.
“I know where that is.”
“Bellhaven?”
“No.”
“Then where?”
“An old storage facility outside Ashford.”
Daniel frowned.
“My father owns property there.”
“Not your father.”
Warren looked at him.
“My father did.”
Forty minutes later, Daniel was in the back of an armored SUV.
Warren drove.
Two additional vehicles followed at a distance.
Daniel had ignored the command to come alone.
He had also ignored Vale’s insistence that they call federal authorities.
“I don’t trust anyone yet,” Daniel had said.
Vale had looked at him.
“That is precisely how your father became isolated.”
“Then perhaps he was right.”
The storage complex had been abandoned for years.
Warren stopped a quarter mile away.
“We go on foot.”
Daniel checked the small pistol Warren had given him.
“I hate guns.”
“You hate your son being threatened more.”
True.
They approached the building from behind.
No guards.
No vehicles.
One broken window.
Daniel smelled dust and old oil.
They entered.
The interior was dark.
Rows of empty shelving stretched toward the rear.
Then Daniel heard Anna.
A muffled cry.
He moved toward the sound.
She was tied to a chair beneath a hanging industrial light.
No one else visible.
Daniel stopped.
“Trap.”
Warren nodded.
They scanned the rafters.
Nothing.
Daniel approached Anna.
Her eyes widened.
She shook her head violently.
“Don’t.”
Daniel saw the wire beneath her chair.
He froze.
A small device was taped underneath.
Digital timer.
03:14.
03:13.
03:12.
Warren cursed.
“Pressure trigger.”
Daniel crouched carefully.
“If we cut the rope?”
“Could activate it.”
Anna was crying.
“I’m sorry.”
Daniel looked at her.
“For what?”
“They made me take the envelope.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where is it?”
“They took it.”
“Did you see them?”
“One man.”
“Description?”
“Mask.”
Daniel looked at the timer.
02:32.
Warren examined the device.
“Old construction.”
“Can you stop it?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe isn’t enough.”
Warren carefully opened the plastic casing.
Daniel kept talking to Anna.
“Did they ask about Noah?”
“Yes.”
“What exactly?”
“They asked whether he remembers the room.”
Daniel felt cold.
“What room?”
“I don’t know.”
“They said a two-year-old remembers a room?”
Anna nodded.
“Then they asked if he still sings the song.”
Daniel stared.
“Noah sings all the time.”
“What song?”
She whispered a melody.
Three simple notes.
Daniel’s skin prickled.
He knew that melody.
He had hummed it himself since childhood.
His mother used to sing it.
The timer reached 01:11.
“Warren.”
“Working.”
01:00.
59.
60.
Warren cut one wire.
Nothing.
Another.
The timer continued.
31.
32.
Daniel gripped Anna’s hand.
“Look at me.”
She sobbed.
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop apologizing.”
Warren cut a third wire.
The timer froze at 19.
Silence.
No explosion.
Anna collapsed forward.
Daniel untied her.
Then an old speaker crackled somewhere above them.
A woman’s voice filled the warehouse.
“Daniel.”
He stopped breathing.
The voice was older.
But he knew it.
He had heard it in dreams for almost thirty years.
His mother.
“Welcome back.”
Daniel looked toward the ceiling.
“Margaret?”
The speaker hissed.
Then she laughed softly.
“You always hated when I called myself that.”
Daniel’s face drained of color.
The voice continued.
“You called me Mom.”
The lights shut off.
A door slammed.
Warren shouted.
By the time emergency lights flickered to life, the far wall had opened.
Behind it was a hidden corridor.
On the concrete floor sat a child’s red ball.
May you like
Exactly like the one Daniel remembered from Bellhaven.
Beside it was a gold key.
