Chapter 22 - The Man in the Rain
Lucas had spent two years hiding.
Not from Bellweather.
From Thomas.
“There’s a difference?” Richard asked.
Lucas nodded.
“Bellweather is infrastructure. Thomas is the man who turned it into a weapon.”
Lucas had worked in cybersecurity.
His brother Jonathan worked compliance.
Together they discovered Thomas was using Bellweather’s intelligence files to orchestrate family succession events.
A vulnerable heir would receive drugs.
A suspicious spouse would be discredited.
A trustee would suddenly face a tax investigation.
A marriage would appear at the perfect moment.
Most targets never realized they had been manipulated.
Jonathan had been ordered to approach Emily.
Instead he fell in love with her.
“Convenient,” Daniel said.
Lucas did not defend him.
“It was wrong.”
Emily answered.
“He knew.”
Lucas nodded.
“He spent the rest of his life trying to undo it.”
Jonathan eventually stole a Bellweather routing ledger.
Not the master ledger.
A copy showing payments between Thomas’s shell companies and outside operators.
“One payment was made forty-eight hours before Catherine Arden died,” Lucas said.
Daniel stopped breathing.
“To whom?”
“A transportation contractor.”
Marcus asked, “What contractor?”
Lucas slid a document across the table.
North Coast Recovery Services.
Richard recognized it.
“They repossess vehicles.”
“They also supplied drivers.”
Daniel looked at the payment amount.
Thirty thousand dollars.
Another payment appeared two years later.
Same contractor.
Three days before Jonathan’s death.
Emily covered her mouth.
Lucas continued.
“My brother knew Thomas would eventually find out he had copied the ledger.”
“Why didn’t he go to police?” Daniel asked.
“Because Bellweather had people in police departments, law firms and banks. Jonathan wanted one piece of evidence Thomas couldn’t explain away.”
“What?”
Lucas looked at Daniel.
“His voice.”
Before Jonathan died, he arranged to record Thomas.
The recording existed.
But Lucas did not have it.
“Where is it?”
“Inside Arden Tower.”
Daniel stared.
“My building?”
“Jonathan hid an encrypted archive inside an old building-management server. The archive only unlocks if two things happen.”
“What things?”
“Bluebird activates.”
“It has.”
“And the Arden voting interest is transferred.”
Samuel immediately shook his head.
“We cannot transfer it.”
Lucas looked at him.
“You don’t need to.”
Daniel understood.
“We make the system think we’re transferring it.”
Marcus leaned forward.
“To whom?”
Lucas gave the answer Thomas had spent years trying to achieve.
“Rebecca Hale.”
Daniel almost laughed.
“That will bring Thomas out.”
“Yes.”
“But Rebecca is in custody.”
Lucas looked toward him.
“Then perhaps it’s time she finally does something useful.”
Daniel did not like the idea.
Emily liked it even less.
But Catherine had spent years building Bluebird because she knew evidence alone might never stop Thomas.
He had to believe he was about to win.
Only then would he expose himself.
Daniel looked at Lucas.
“What happens when the system detects the transfer?”
“Jonathan’s archive opens.”
“And Thomas?”
“He receives the same alert Bellweather always receives when ownership changes.”
Richard smiled without humor.
“He comes running.”
Lucas nodded.
“That was Jonathan’s trap.”
Daniel looked at Emily.
She understood the risk.
May you like
“Do it,” she said.
For once, Daniel did not overrule her.
