Chapter 4 - The Wrong Enemy
Daniel Price looked nothing like a man who had successfully escaped.
He looked like a man who had realized escape was impossible.
Dominic watched him through the observation window at Mercy Harbor Clinic.
Daniel’s hair was damp.
His expensive rehabilitation jacket was gone.
There was a bruise along his cheek, but no serious injury.
Two police officers waited outside the treatment room.
Vincent stood beside Dominic.
“You still want to go in?”
“Yes.”
“You’re technically one of the people he says he needs protection from.”
“He said Arthur.”
“He also worked in your house.”
Dominic opened the door.
Daniel looked up.
Fear moved across his face.
“Mr. Vale.”
“Tell me why my brace was altered.”
Daniel glanced at the officers.
Dominic pulled a chair across the floor and sat.
“You came here because you wanted protection. Start talking.”
Daniel rubbed his hands together.
“Arthur hired me.”
“For what?”
“To monitor your recovery.”
“I already had doctors.”
“He didn’t trust them.”
“Why?”
Daniel looked at him.
“Because he thought someone was trying to make you worse.”
Dominic said nothing.
Daniel continued.
“Two weeks after I started, I noticed your brace settings weren’t staying where I left them.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I told Arthur.”
“Why him?”
“He was paying me.”
Dominic’s jaw tightened.
Daniel swallowed.
“He told me not to confront anyone. He wanted to know who was doing it.”
“So you watched?”
“Yes.”
“And yesterday?”
“I found the lower strap reversed.”
“Did you correct it?”
Daniel looked down.
“No.”
Vincent stepped forward.
Dominic lifted one hand.
“Why not?”
“Because Arthur told me to leave it for one morning.”
The room chilled.
Daniel spoke faster.
“He wanted proof. He had a tiny security marker placed on the clip. We were supposed to see who touched it.”
Dominic stared at him.
“You deliberately left a harmful adjustment on my leg.”
“For a few hours.”
“A four-year-old found it before you fixed it.”
“I know.”
“You ran.”
“Because Peter Lang saw me checking the marker.”
“Peter worked with you?”
“No.”
Daniel shook his head.
“He’s the one I was watching.”
Dominic leaned forward.
“Why?”
“I saw him coming out of the therapy room twice.”
“What was in the brown bag?”
Daniel blinked.
“What brown bag?”
“Yesterday.”
Daniel’s face went blank.
“I never got a bag from Peter.”
Dominic looked at Vincent.
Ellie had said otherwise.
Was the child mistaken?
Then Daniel said, “Wait.”
He rubbed his forehead.
“There was a brown package outside the therapy room. Peter was carrying it. He asked whether it belonged to me. I said no.”
“What happened to it?”
“He put it on the counter.”
“What was inside?”
“I don’t know.”
Dominic remembered Ellie’s exact language.
He gave Orange Man a bag.
At four years old, she might have interpreted placing it beside him as giving it to him.
“And the strap?”
Daniel nodded slowly.
“I had a spare brace component on the counter. I put it into my medical case.”
That was what Ellie had seen.
A fragment of truth.
But enough.
“What happened after Peter saw you checking the marker?”
“He told me someone wanted to speak with me outside.”
“Who?”
“He wouldn’t say.”
“I went out. There was a car waiting. I realized something was wrong and ran through the parking structure. The SUV followed me.”
“The airport?”
“I thought crowds and cameras would help.”
“Who drove Arthur’s car from my estate?”
Daniel looked confused.
“Arthur’s car?”
Dominic studied him.
Daniel appeared genuinely surprised.
Vincent’s phone buzzed.
A message from estate security.
He read it.
Then passed the phone to Dominic.
They had searched Peter Lang’s locker.
Inside was a second phone.
On it were photographs of Dominic’s rehabilitation schedule.
Photographs of his brace.
Photographs of his cane.
And dozens of messages from a contact saved only as M.
Dominic scrolled.
Most were logistical.
7:15 tomorrow.
West hall clear.
Mercer arrives 8:30.
Then one message stopped him.
MAKE SURE VOSS SEES THE CHANGE.
Dominic read it again.
Not Dominic.
Voss.
Someone wanted Arthur to notice.
Someone wanted Arthur to investigate.
Why?
The answer came in the next message.
IF HE MOVES TOO EARLY, BOTH OF THEM FALL.
Dominic looked at Vincent.
This had never been about replacing one man.
Someone wanted Dominic and Arthur to destroy each other.
“Who’s M?” Vincent asked.
Daniel shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Dominic stood.
“Arthur might.”
Back at the estate, Arthur sat alone in the conference room.
His anger had cooled into something more dangerous.
When Dominic entered, Arthur looked at his leg.
“No brace.”
“No.”
“Pain?”
“Less.”
Arthur nodded.
Dominic placed the phone in front of him.
“Who is M?”
Arthur read the messages.
For the first time all day, genuine fear entered his eyes.
Dominic saw it.
“You know.”
Arthur looked toward the door.
“Close it.”
Vincent did.
Arthur lowered his voice.
“Twenty-three years ago, your father had three men he trusted with everything.”
“I know.”
“Me. Salvatore Bell. And Martin Vale.”
Dominic stared at him.
His uncle.
Martin Vale had helped build the legitimate side of the family businesses.
Shipping.
Construction.
Property.
He had also spent the last decade living quietly in Florida, supposedly retired.
“Martin?”
Arthur tapped the phone.
“M.”
“That’s your evidence?”
“No.”
Arthur looked at Dominic.
“Your father never intended you to inherit everything.”
Dominic’s face remained unreadable.
“He changed his will six months before he died,” Arthur continued. “Martin lost control of the holding companies. He never forgave you.”
“That was fifteen years ago.”
“Men like Martin don’t measure grudges in days.”
Dominic paced slowly.
“Why now?”
Arthur looked at his injured leg.
“Because the crash gave him something he never had before.”
“What?”
“A believable weakness.”
Dominic stopped.
Arthur continued.
“He didn’t need to kill you. He needed everyone to believe you couldn’t lead.”
“And you?”
“I was the obvious successor.”
“So he framed you.”
Arthur gave a humorless smile.
“He knew I’d investigate. He knew you’d find my payments to Daniel. He wanted you to think I caused your decline.”
Vincent crossed his arms.
“Convenient.”
“Yes.”
Arthur looked at him.
“It is.”
Dominic watched Arthur carefully.
“Why didn’t you tell me you hired Daniel?”
“Because I didn’t know who inside your house I could trust.”
“You could have trusted me.”
Arthur’s eyes sharpened.
“Could I? You were in pain. Angry. Surrounded by people telling you I wanted your chair.”
Dominic did not answer.
Because Arthur was right about one thing.
Dominic had suspected him before Ellie ever touched the brace.
A knock sounded at the door.
One of Vincent’s men entered.
“We found Peter’s financial records.”
Dominic turned.
“And?”
“No unexplained payments.”
Arthur frowned.
“Then why help Martin?”
“He may not have.”
The guard placed a photograph on the table.
Peter Lang entering a café three weeks earlier.
Across from him sat a woman.
Clare Rowan.
Dominic stared at the photograph.
Vincent’s face changed.
Arthur slowly leaned back.
And for several seconds, nobody said anything.
Then Dominic picked up the picture.
The woman whose daughter had exposed the sabotage had been meeting privately with the man they believed responsible for it.
“Bring Clare to me,” Dominic said.
But when Vincent went to the library, he found the guards unconscious in the corridor.
The door was open.
Clare was gone.
And so was Ellie.
On the floor lay the little wooden latch toy.
May you like
One buckle had been snapped clean off.
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