Chapter 6 - The Son with the Gun
Harrison raised one hand.
“Do not start the engine.”
Elena pulled Mia behind her.
Margaret stared at her eldest son.
“Put down the weapon.”
Harrison looked toward the house.
“They are searching the west wing. We have less than two minutes.”
Margaret did not move.
“Who are they?”
“I don’t know all their names.”
“That is not an answer.”
Harrison placed the gun on the dock and kicked it toward her.
“I came to get you out.”
Elena looked at him.
“How did you know we were here?”
“Samuel sent me a coded message before you left the city.”
Margaret’s expression darkened.
“He trusted you?”
“He trusted that I would protect you.”
“Have you?”
The question struck him.
Harrison looked away.
“There is a road beyond the eastern trail. My car is hidden there.”
“What about Samuel?” Elena asked.
“I saw him leave through the kitchen. He is alive.”
A crash sounded from the house.
Harrison stepped onto the boat.
“We need to move.”
Margaret blocked him with her cane.
“Not until you tell me what you know about the trust.”
He stared at her.
“Mother.”
“What did your father tell you about Thomas Carter?”
Another crash came closer.
Harrison spoke quickly.
“Father said Thomas was a liability.”
Elena’s face hardened.
“What else?”
“He said Thomas betrayed the company.”
“That was a lie,” Margaret said.
“I know that now.”
“When did you learn?”
“Six months ago.”
Elena’s anger sharpened.
“And you said nothing?”
Harrison looked at her.
“I found payments in an old corporate ledger. They continued for years after your father’s death.”
“Payments to whom?”
“A company called North Passage Consulting.”
Samuel had mentioned no such company.
Harrison continued.
“It was a shell. The funds moved from Ashford Holdings to judges, police officers, regulators, and private security contractors.”
“Who authorized them?” Margaret asked.
“Father’s signature was on the early transfers.”
“And the later ones?”
Harrison hesitated.
“Mine.”
Margaret’s face changed.
“You continued the payments.”
“I thought they were legitimate retainers.”
“For eleven years?”
“I stopped them when I discovered the shell structure.”
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
The timing was clear.
The moment Harrison stopped the money, someone began searching for the old trust.
A shadow moved behind the boathouse windows.
Harrison grabbed the gun.
“Get down.”
A bullet struck the wooden frame.
Mia screamed.
Harrison fired toward the window, then untied the boat.
Elena started the engine.
The old motor coughed, sputtered, and finally roared.
They shot away from the dock as another bullet struck the water.
Margaret held Mia beneath the seats.
Harrison crouched beside Elena.
“Follow the shoreline north. There is a narrow inlet hidden behind the reeds.”
“Who is shooting at us?”
“I believe they work for Victor Dane.”
Margaret looked up sharply.
“Victor is dead.”
“That is what Father told everyone.”
Victor Dane had been Edward Ashford’s closest friend during the company’s earliest years.
Margaret remembered him as charming, brilliant, and dangerously persuasive.
He had supposedly died in a plane crash overseas thirty years earlier.
“No body was recovered,” Harrison said.
Margaret’s face became distant.
“Victor was the third founder.”
“Yes.”
Elena tightened her hands around the wheel.
“Then Victor killed my father.”
“I don’t know.”
“You knew his name and kept it from us.”
“I needed proof.”
“No. You needed time to protect yourself.”
Harrison absorbed the accusation.
The boat entered a narrow channel surrounded by reeds.
The gunfire stopped.
Ahead, a wooden landing appeared beneath the trees.
A dark sedan waited on the road beyond it.
Julian stood beside the driver’s door.
When they reached shore, he helped Margaret onto the dock.
“You look terrible,” he told Harrison.
“So do you.”
“That is because your wife hit me with a lamp.”
Margaret turned.
“Vanessa?”
“She searched your suite after the party. I tried to stop her.”
“Where is she now?”
“At Ashford Hall with Camille.”
Harrison looked alarmed.
“You left them there?”
“They locked themselves in the archive.”
Margaret began walking toward the car.
“Then we go back.”
Samuel emerged from the passenger seat with blood on his collar.
Elena rushed toward him.
“You’re hurt.”
“Not seriously.”
“What happened inside?”
“Three men searched the study. They wanted the cassette and the pendant.”
Margaret held up the cassette.
“They did not get either.”
Samuel opened the rear door.
“They may not need them.”
He removed a tablet computer.
A security image displayed Vanessa inside Margaret’s private archive.
She stood beside Camille and Vane.
On the table before them lay a second silver bluebird.
Mia touched the pendant around her neck.
“They found the other bird.”
Samuel enlarged the image.
Camille held a sheet of paper.
The paper contained a map of Ashford Hall and a red circle beneath the old chapel.
Margaret stared at it.
“The family crypt.”
Harrison looked at his mother.
“What is beneath it?”
May you like
Margaret’s voice was barely audible.
“The room Edward made me promise never to open.”
