Chapter 17: Charlotte Whitlock
Walt appeared in a video tied to a chair inside a fishing warehouse.
Charlotte stood beside him.
She had Claire’s blonde hair and Sebastian’s eyes.
“I wanted to see whether Daniel Carver still rescues people who cannot offer him power.”
Daniel watched the recording with Hannah and federal agents.
Charlotte continued.
“Bring Lily to Black Cove before midnight.”
Hannah’s face became cold.
“She knows we will never do that.”
“She wants Daniel,” Caleb said.
The video ended with coordinates.
Black Cove was accessible only by boat.
A storm was approaching from the northeast.
Federal agents planned surveillance, but Daniel believed Charlotte expected them.
“She grew up watching Sebastian plan operations,” he said. “The warehouse will be a distraction.”
“Then where is Walt?” Hannah asked.
“In the video, I heard a lighthouse horn.”
Caleb searched maritime maps.
Only one lighthouse near Black Cove used that signal interval.
Charlotte was holding Walt on Gray Rock Island, six miles offshore.
Daniel prepared a rescue boat.
Hannah put on a waterproof coat.
“You are not coming.”
Her expression stopped him.
Daniel corrected himself.
“The storm will be dangerous.”
“So will staying here while Charlotte believes she can control us through fear.”
Martin remained with Lily and Ben inside a secure Coast Guard facility.
Daniel, Hannah, Caleb, Vincent, and four federal agents left the harbor before dark.
Waves struck the boat.
Lightning flashed above the black water.
Gray Rock Island appeared as a dark shape beneath the lighthouse beam.
They found the fishing warehouse empty.
A monitor played the same video on a loop.
Daniel examined the chair.
“The ropes are dry. Walt was never here.”
Hannah heard something beneath the floor.
A muffled voice.
They opened a storage hatch and found Walt tied inside a drainage compartment.
He was alive.
“It’s a trap,” he gasped. “She went to the Coast Guard station.”
Charlotte had used Walt to draw Daniel and Hannah away from Lily.
Martin noticed the breach first.
A woman wearing a federal uniform entered the secure wing.
Her identification passed electronic verification.
But Martin recognized her eyes from the engagement footage.
He pulled Ben and Lily into a reinforced room.
Charlotte fired through the closing door.
The lock engaged.
She placed explosives against the hinges.
Ben held Lily while Martin contacted Daniel.
The call reached the rescue boat.
“She is here.”
Daniel turned the vessel through the storm.
The Coast Guard station was forty minutes away.
They did not have forty minutes.
Caleb contacted the station commander.
No one answered.
Charlotte had cut communications.
Inside the reinforced room, Martin searched for another exit.
An emergency ventilation duct opened into the lower maintenance area.
It was too narrow for him.
Ben could fit.
“You take Lily,” Martin said.
Ben stared at him.
“What about you?”
“I will follow.”
“You won’t fit.”
Martin placed both hands on the boy’s shoulders.
“You carried a message once when Hannah needed help. Now I need you to carry Lily.”
An explosion struck the door.
Ben placed Lily inside a rescue basket and crawled into the duct, pulling her carefully.
Martin remained behind with a pistol.
Charlotte broke through the outer hinge.
“Where is the baby?”
Martin aimed at her.
“Safe.”
She shot him.
The bullet struck his chest.
Ben heard the gunfire through the duct but continued crawling.
He emerged inside the equipment garage.
Lily began crying.
Charlotte heard her.
Ben pushed the basket beneath a rescue truck and ran in the opposite direction.
“Here!” he shouted.
Charlotte followed him.
Ben led her toward the dock.
She caught him near the edge and struck him to the ground.
“Where is she?”
Ben spat blood onto the concrete.
“I don’t cheat.”
Charlotte frowned.
“It’s strategy.”
A rescue truck suddenly accelerated from the garage.
The station commander, wounded but alive, drove toward Charlotte.
She jumped aside.
Ben rolled behind a barrier.
Daniel’s boat reached the dock minutes later.
Hannah ran past him into the station.
She found Lily beneath the truck.
Their daughter was frightened but unharmed.
Daniel found Martin bleeding inside the reinforced room.
“Stay with me.”
Martin struggled to breathe.
“Ben?”
“Safe.”
“Lily?”
“Safe.”
Martin’s eyes closed briefly.
“I told you she needed a father.”
“You can tell me again tomorrow.”
Daniel pressed both hands against the wound.
Charlotte escaped into the storm aboard a small Coast Guard vessel.
Martin survived surgery, but the bullet remained close to his heart.
Ben sat beside his bed throughout the night.
Daniel stood outside the hospital with Hannah.
“She will not stop,” he said.
“No.”
“She believes Lily represents everything stolen from her.”
“Then we show her the truth.”
Daniel looked at Hannah.
“What truth?”
“Sebastian did not protect Charlotte. He imprisoned her.”
Claire possessed the only testimony that might reach her sister.
Hannah requested an emergency prison visit.
When Claire learned Charlotte was alive, she collapsed.
“My father told me she died.”
“He hid her for twenty-five years,” Hannah said.
“Why?”
“Because she saw him kill your mother.”
Claire covered her face.
Hannah continued.
“Charlotte is trying to kill Lily.”
Claire looked up.
“What do you need me to do?”
“Speak to your sister.”
Claire agreed.
But Charlotte had already released another video.
She stood inside the ruined Carver mansion ballroom, now under renovation.
Behind her, gasoline covered the marble floor.
May you like
“Bring Claire and the child,” she said. “Let the two bloodlines end where the truth began.”
Then she lit a match.
