Chapter 4 - The Agent Daniel Feared
Reed did not reach for his weapon.
That frightened Evelyn more than any sudden movement could have.
He looked at the frozen image of Daniel.
“When was this recorded?”
Priya checked the file information.
“There’s no reliable timestamp.”
“Play it again.”
Daniel’s warning repeated.
Mom, do not trust Agent Reed.
Every agent in the room became still.
Reed looked at Evelyn.
“I’ve never met your son.”
“That isn’t what he said.”
“I know exactly what he said.”
“Why would Daniel know your name?”
Reed removed his badge and placed it on the table.
“You should ask the people who created that video.”
Priya disconnected the laptop from the network.
“Sir, protocol requires us to notify internal security.”
“Do it.”
Evelyn studied Reed’s face.
He seemed disturbed, but not surprised enough.
“You knew Daniel was alive.”
“No.”
“You knew about B9.”
Reed did not answer immediately.
That was enough.
Evelyn reached for the remote.
Reed raised both hands.
“B9 appeared in another investigation eight years ago.”
“What investigation?”
“A missing-witness case.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“Because the file was classified.”
“My son was imprisoned for eleven years.”
“At the time, B9 was believed to be a financial code.”
Evelyn pressed the second button.
The remote’s speaker crackled again.
No voice came through.
Instead, a sequence of numbers appeared on its tiny display.
41.9028.
12.4964.
Priya entered them into the computer.
“Coordinates,” she said. “Rome.”
A second sequence replaced the first.
Then a third.
Locations appeared across the screen.
Rome.
Lisbon.
Zurich.
Boston.
Savannah.
Each coordinate marked a building owned indirectly by a Hale shell company.
Reed looked at the pattern.
“These aren’t random properties.”
Evelyn recognized the Boston location.
“A children’s clinic.”
Priya checked Lisbon.
“Private rehabilitation center.”
Zurich was registered as a neurological research foundation.
Savannah was an abandoned military hospital.
Reed’s jaw tightened.
“B9 may not be a single location.”
Evelyn understood.
“It’s a network.”
The remote displayed one last coordinate.
It was less than forty miles away.
Blackwood County.
Priya zoomed in on the map.
The coordinate pointed to an empty stretch of forest beside an old limestone quarry.
Reed immediately contacted a tactical unit.
Before he finished the call, federal internal security arrived.
They separated Reed from the investigation, confiscated his phone, and escorted him into another room.
He did not resist.
As he passed Evelyn, he whispered, “The crown has nine points.”
The symbol behind Daniel had appeared broken, but Evelyn remembered only eight visible points.
Reed was telling her something without saying it aloud.
Someone inside the federal building might be listening.
Two hours later, Evelyn was transported to the medical center where Mara had been taken.
Mara sat upright in a secure room wearing a hospital gown. Her champagne dress had been collected as evidence.
She looked younger without makeup.
More like the child who once slept beside Evelyn during thunderstorms.
Mara avoided her eyes.
“The doctors found something.”
Evelyn sat carefully beside the bed.
“What?”
“A tracking capsule under my skin.”
“Where?”
“Behind my shoulder.”
Evelyn felt sick.
“The injection?”
“They think it was implanted months ago.”
Mara pressed her lips together.
“There’s more.”
Laboratory testing showed that Mara’s blood contained traces of a drug designed to increase suggestibility while reducing emotional resistance.
Victor had not merely lied to her.
He had been chemically manipulating her.
Mara stared at her hands.
“Did the drug make me hurt you?”
Evelyn answered honestly.
“It may have made it easier.”
“But I still did it.”
“Yes.”
Tears rolled down Mara’s face.
“I believed everything he said.”
“He made sure you did.”
Mara looked at the bandages around Evelyn’s body.
“Will you ever forgive me?”
Evelyn wanted to say yes.
A mother’s instinct urged her to erase the question, embrace her daughter, and pretend the harm had come entirely from Victor.
But forgiveness built on another lie would be fragile.
“I hope so,” Evelyn said. “But first, we survive what he planned.”
Mara nodded through her tears.
Then she remembered something.
“The night before your crash, Dad gave me a locked case.”
“What was inside?”
“I never opened it. He told me to hide it in Daniel’s old room.”
“Where?”
“Under the floor near the window.”
Federal agents searched the room and found the case.
Inside were six passports bearing Mara’s photograph under different names.
There was also a white dress, twenty thousand dollars in cash, and a handwritten schedule.
Day 1: Separation.
Day 3: Extraction.
Day 6: Replacement.
At the bottom of the schedule, Victor had written:
Transfer Mara Hale to Crown Nine after maternal termination.
Evelyn read the sentence twice.
Mara whispered, “What does replacement mean?”
Before Evelyn could answer, the hospital lights went out.
May you like
Emergency alarms began to scream.
In the darkness, someone unlocked Mara’s door from the outside.
