Chapter 7 - THE NIGHT NOAH DISAPPEAREDDominic reached the estate in fourteen minutes.
Clara came with him despite his order to remain at the hospital.
“You should be with Tyler.”
“He's in surgery. Noah is alone.”
“He has guards.”
“Apparently not enough.”
Dominic stopped arguing.
The front gates stood open.
Two guards were unconscious near the security booth.
Not dead.
Drugged.
Inside, the mansion was silent.
Too silent.
Dominic drew his pistol.
Clara stayed behind him.
This time she listened.
They reached Noah's room.
Empty.
The bedspread had been pulled aside.
On the pillow sat the silver pendant engraved M.V.
Dominic picked it up.
His hand shook.
Clara searched the room.
No blood.
No signs of struggle.
“Noah knew whoever came in.”
Dominic looked at her.
“How?”
“If he fought, this room would be destroyed.”
She was right.
Noah fought everyone who frightened him.
But whoever took him had gotten close without triggering panic.
Dominic immediately thought of Hargrove.
Impossible.
She was in federal custody.
Marcus was in custody too.
Then Clara saw a cookie wrapper on the floor.
Chocolate.
She picked it up.
“Does Noah eat these?”
“No. Elena had a severe nut allergy. We never kept processed desserts in his room.”
Clara smelled the wrapper.
Almond.
Her eyes widened.
“A sedative?”
Dominic called the estate doctor.
Minutes later, residue from the wrapper tested positive for a sleep medication.
Someone had drugged Noah.
Security footage had been looped.
An internal access code disabled alarms.
Only six people possessed that code.
Dominic.
Mrs. Hargrove.
The head of security.
His mother.
Marcus Sloan.
And Dominic's cousin—
Anthony Vale.
Anthony arrived thirty minutes later wearing jeans and a leather jacket, acting offended that anyone suspected him.
He was thirty-six, handsome, charming, and had spent most of his adult life staying far enough from Dominic's business to appear clean.
“I came because you called.”
Dominic stared at him.
“Where were you tonight?”
“At home.”
“Prove it.”
Anthony laughed.
“Are you serious?”
Dominic hit him.
Once.
Hard enough to knock him against the wall.
Clara flinched.
Anthony touched blood at his lip.
“Still solving everything with your fists?”
“My son is missing.”
“And you think I took him?”
“I think somebody used your access code.”
Anthony's face changed.
“My code was deactivated years ago.”
“No.”
Dominic stepped closer.
“It wasn't.”
Anthony stopped talking.
That silence answered too much.
Agent Carter arrived.
She placed Anthony under temporary detention.
Then one of Dominic's technicians found a signal.
Noah's pendant contained a tiny GPS locator.
Elena had installed it when he was a baby.
Dominic had forgotten.
The signal came from an abandoned church outside Waukegan.
They moved immediately.
Federal agents surrounded the property.
Dominic wanted to lead the entry.
Carter refused.
“If Victor sees you, he may kill the boy.”
“He already wants me there.”
“How do you know?”
Dominic's phone rang.
Victor.
“Come alone.”
Dominic looked at Carter.
She shook her head.
Victor continued.
“You have thirty minutes. Every agent who enters before you costs Noah one finger.”
Clara felt physically ill.
Dominic's expression went blank.
“I'll come.”
“No vest. No weapon.”
The call ended.
Carter grabbed his arm.
“You're not walking into that church alone.”
“Yes, I am.”
Clara stepped forward.
“No.”
Dominic looked at her.
“You don't get a vote.”
“I got involved when Noah ran into my arms.”
“This isn't your family.”
The moment the words left his mouth, regret crossed his face.
Clara went still.
Then she nodded.
“Fine.”
She walked away.
Dominic nearly called her back.
He didn't.
Twenty minutes later he entered the church alone.
At least he believed he did.
Clara had hidden in the trunk of Carter's unmarked vehicle until they reached the perimeter, then slipped through a side cemetery.
Reckless.
Stupid.
But she had remembered something Noah once whispered.
Red door.
The abandoned church had one.
A red side entrance.
She entered there.
Inside, candlelight flickered across broken pews.
Dominic stood near the altar.
Victor held Noah.
The boy was conscious but weak.
A gun pressed against his head.
“Daddy,” Noah whispered.
Dominic's face broke.
It was the first time his son had called him that since Elena died.
Victor smiled.
“Touching.”
“What do you want?”
“Signatures.”
A folder lay on the altar.
Control of several trusts.
Clara's father's estate.
Noah's future inheritance.
Dominic's shipping companies.
Everything Victor had failed to steal legally.
“Sign and he lives.”
Dominic walked toward the folder.
Victor laughed.
“The great Dominic Vale finally obedient.”
Dominic picked up the pen.
Then Noah looked past Victor.
Straight toward Clara hidden behind a confession booth.
His eyes widened.
She pressed a finger to her lips.
Just like he had done beneath his bed.
Noah understood.
Dominic signed the first page.
Victor relaxed.
Clara moved.
A loose board creaked.
Victor spun.
Clara threw a metal candle stand.
It struck his wrist.
The gun fired into the ceiling.
Dominic launched across the altar.
Noah fell.
Clara caught him.
Victor and Dominic crashed into the pews.
Gunfire erupted outside as agents entered.
Victor pulled a knife.
He slashed Dominic's shoulder.
Dominic punched him.
Again.
Again.
Years of grief exploded through every strike.
“You killed her!”
Victor laughed through blood.
“She was going to destroy everything!”
Dominic grabbed his throat.
“You made my son watch.”
Victor's face reddened.
“You made him weak.”
That sentence nearly killed him.
Dominic tightened his grip.
Clara saw it.
“Dominic!”
He didn't hear.
“Dominic, Noah is watching!”
He froze.
Noah stood in Clara's arms.
Terrified.
Watching his father become exactly what Victor wanted him to be.
Dominic released Victor.
Agent Carter rushed forward.
Victor was handcuffed.
Dominic backed away.
His hands were covered in blood.
Noah stared at him.
For one horrible second, Dominic expected his son to recoil.
Instead Noah reached toward him.
“Daddy.”
Dominic broke.
He took Noah into his arms and sank to his knees.
The feared man of Chicago held his four-year-old son in a ruined church and cried without hiding it.
Clara turned away to give them privacy.
Then Victor laughed from the floor.
“You think this ends with me?”
Carter tightened the cuffs.
He looked at Clara.
“Your father left something too.”
She stared.
“What?”
“A ledger.”
Dominic looked up.
Victor smiled through swollen lips.
“Daniel Vale kept records of every dirty payment your family ever made.”
He looked at Dominic.
“Enough to destroy your empire.”
Clara's stomach dropped.
Victor continued.
“And the FBI doesn't have it.”
Agent Carter's eyes narrowed.
“Where is it?”
Victor smiled.
“Ask Daniel's daughter.”
Clara shook her head.
“I don't know anything about a ledger.”
Victor's smile widened.
“Oh, you do.”
Then he said four words that dragged her childhood back into the room.
“Under the blue floor.”
Clara stopped breathing.
When she was little, Maria had kept an old blue-painted trunk beneath Clara's bed.
The same trunk she had been told never to open.
May you like
The same trunk still sitting in their storage basement in Cicero.
And suddenly every secret in her life had a key.
