Chapter 6 - FIRE BELOW GROUND
The vault door would not open.
The bank officer entered the security code twice.
Both attempts failed.
Smoke thickened along the ceiling.
The fire alarm pulsed through the underground chamber.
Nathan grabbed the hard drives and shoved them into his coat.
I gathered the notebooks and corporate records.
The bank officer moved toward a red emergency panel.
“The manual release is not responding.”
“Is there another exit?” Nathan asked.
“A service corridor.”
He led us between rows of metal boxes toward the rear wall.
The corridor door required a key card.
His card produced a red light.
Someone had overridden the security system.
This was not a random fire.
The person upstairs knew exactly where we were.
Nathan pulled out his phone.
There was no signal in the vault.
I looked at the ceiling.
The smoke was darkening.
“Sprinklers?”
“The vault has a chemical suppression system.”
“Why hasn’t it activated?”
“It should have.”
A heavy impact struck the main door.
Firefighters had arrived.
But the reinforced steel was designed to resist explosives.
It would take time to force open.
The bank officer began coughing.
I wrapped a scarf over my mouth.
Nathan searched the walls.
“Every secured room requires a mechanical emergency release.”
The officer pointed toward a decorative metal panel.
“It is behind there.”
We pried it open with the edge of a document tray.
Inside was a lever secured by a steel pin.
Nathan pulled.
Nothing moved.
“The pin is locked.”
I looked at our mother’s silver necklace in my hand.
The pendant was shaped like a narrow star.
Rachel had placed it in the box for a reason.
I examined the pendant’s tip.
It fit into the small opening above the pin.
I pressed it inside.
A hidden spring released.
The pin dropped.
The lever moved.
The service door opened.
Fresh air rushed through the corridor.
We emerged into a basement records room as firefighters broke through the main lobby.
The fire had begun in an electrical closet.
Accelerant had been poured along the stairwell.
Security cameras showed a maintenance worker entering twenty minutes before us.
The uniform was fake.
The face belonged to Dr. Elaine Foster.
By the time police identified her, she was gone.
We reached Stonebridge Aviation at three forty-eight in the morning.
The hangar was empty.
A black van sat behind it with the rear doors open.
Inside, police found Ethan’s jacket.
There was blood on one sleeve.
I nearly collapsed.
A paramedic examined the stain and said it was too little to determine whether someone was badly injured.
No aircraft had departed officially.
But a groundskeeper reported hearing a small plane taxi toward an unused service runway.
Security logs had been erased.
Nathan studied a map of private airports.
“They could still be in the region.”
“Or over the ocean.”
A police helicopter began searching.
The Federal Aviation Administration was notified.
Border authorities received photographs of the children.
At four twelve, Sophie called me from the estate.
“Mom?”
Her voice was small.
“I’m here.”
“Did you find Ethan?”
“Not yet.”
I hated the lie that almost escaped me.
I wanted to say he was safe.
I wanted to promise I would bring him home.
But I had already seen how lies poisoned children.
“We know more than we did before,” I said.
“We’re getting closer.”
She was quiet.
Then she whispered, “Dad called me.”
My body stiffened.
“What did he say?”
“He said I should delete the recording.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Where is the phone?”
“With me.”
“Do not give it to anyone.”
“He said you might go to jail.”
“He is trying to scare you.”
“He sounded scared too.”
I closed my eyes.
Daniel had taught Sophie to ride a bicycle.
He had stayed awake beside her when she had pneumonia.
He knew the songs that calmed Ethan after nightmares.
People were rarely monsters every moment of their lives.
That made betrayal harder to understand.
A completely cruel person was easy to abandon.
Daniel had been loving often enough to make his treachery feel impossible.
“Sophie, listen carefully.”
“What your father did was wrong.”
“But you are not responsible for what happens to him.”
“Okay.”
“Is the officer still with you?”
“Yes.”
“Stay beside her.”
A pause.
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“I found something in Grandma’s purse.”
“What?”
“A red pen.”
I thought of the message left on Daniel’s plate.
YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED QUIET.
“Anything else?”
“A hotel key.”
She read the name.
“The Crescent Harbor.”
Nathan overheard.
“That is near the East River.”
I asked Sophie for the room number.
“1106.”
We notified the NYPD.
Officers reached the hotel within twelve minutes.
Room 1106 was registered to Margaret under a false name.
She was not there.
But the room contained children’s clothing, burner phones, and a printed schedule for a private ferry leaving Pier 19 at four thirty.
We had eighteen minutes.
Police vehicles raced toward Manhattan.
Nathan and I followed.
The rain had stopped, but fog covered the river.
At Pier 19, a white ferry was pulling away from the dock.
Police ordered it to stop.
It continued into the fog.
A harbor patrol boat moved to intercept.
Through binoculars, an officer saw three adults and two children on the rear deck.
I could not make out their faces.
Then a child in a red shirt ran toward the railing.
Ethan owned a red shirt.
The ferry turned sharply.
Someone grabbed the child and pulled him out of sight.
A harbor officer shouted into the radio.
“The vessel is not responding.”
Nathan looked toward the far side of the pier.
A second ferry waited in darkness.
Its engine was running.
On its deck stood Daniel.
He held a phone to his ear.
When he saw me, he lowered it.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded.
“I followed my mother’s driver.”
“Why didn’t you call the police?”
“Because she said she would hurt Ethan if I did.”
He pointed toward the first ferry.
“That boat is a decoy.”
My heart pounded.
“Where are they?”
Daniel looked toward the silent ferry beside him.
“They are below deck.”
A gunshot cracked through the fog.
The window behind Daniel shattered.
May you like
He dropped to the ground.
From inside the second ferry, Ethan screamed my name.
