Chapter 13 - The Last Drive
Charles drove north.
Rain hammered the windshield.
Claire kept her hands visible.
“You think killing me fixes this?”
“No.”
Charles sounded strangely calm.
“Killing you ends it.”
“The trust exists.”
“Companies can be dismantled.”
“The recordings exist.”
“Lawyers create doubt.”
“Richard will testify.”
“Richard is a coward.”
Claire looked at him.
“And you?”
His mouth tightened.
“I built everything.”
“My mother built half.”
“I made it powerful.”
“I kept it alive.”
That hurt him.
Good.
Claire continued.
“You never understood the business. That’s why you needed me.”
“Stop talking.”
“You hated me and needed me at the same time.”
“Stop.”
“You couldn’t give me a title because then people would see who was actually running the company.”
Charles slammed his fist against the steering wheel.
“Shut up!”
The car swerved.
Claire grabbed the door.
Then she saw headlights behind them.
Far back.
One vehicle.
Black SUV.
Dominic.
Charles saw it too.
His face changed.
“How?”
Claire almost smiled.
“You really think Dominic Vale only gave me one tracker?”
Charles cursed.
He accelerated.
The highway curved.
Wet pavement.
High speed.
Claire remembered her mother.
The failed brakes.
The panic she must have felt.
Not again.
“Slow down.”
Charles laughed.
“Scared?”
“Yes.”
The answer surprised him.
Claire continued.
“I’m scared because I want to live.”
She looked directly at him.
“I have things you never let Mom have.”
“What?”
“A future.”
Charles looked at her.
That second was enough.
Claire grabbed the steering wheel.
The car jerked sideways.
Charles fought her.
“Let go!”
She drove her elbow into his injured shoulder.
He screamed.
The gun fell between the seats.
Claire reached for it.
Charles grabbed her hair.
The car crossed one lane.
A truck blasted its horn.
Claire kicked the gun under the brake pedal.
Charles looked down.
Then up.
Too late.
The Mercedes smashed through a guardrail and slid down a muddy slope.
Airbags exploded.
Metal screamed.
The car stopped against a tree.
For several seconds, Claire heard nothing.
Then rain.
Her ears rang.
Blood trickled down Charles’s forehead.
He was conscious.
So was she.
Claire tried the door.
Jammed.
Charles moved.
His hand reached toward the floor.
The gun.
Claire kicked it farther.
He grabbed her throat.
“You ruin everything!”
Claire clawed at his wrist.
The pressure increased.
Then the driver’s window shattered.
A hand reached through.
Charles was dragged backward.
Dominic.
The door was ripped open from outside.
Marcus pulled Charles from the car.
Claire fell sideways, gasping.
Dominic climbed in.
“Claire.”
She stared at him.
“You found me.”
His hands touched her face, shoulders, arms, checking injuries.
“You put a second tracker in my shoe.”
“Third.”
She blinked.
“Third?”
“Your necklace.”
Despite the pain, she laughed.
Then started crying.
Dominic pulled her against him.
Not carefully.
Desperately.
Claire buried her face against his chest.
For fifteen years, she had handled everything alone.
For fifteen years, asking for help had felt dangerous.
Now Dominic held her in a wrecked car on the same road where her mother had died.
And for once, Claire let someone else hold the weight.
Police arrived minutes later.
Charles was arrested again.
This time, he did not escape.
As officers dragged him toward a cruiser, he looked back at Claire.
“You’ll destroy Whitmore Freight.”
Claire stood beneath Dominic’s coat.
“No.”
She looked at the man who had spent half her life convincing her she was nothing.
“I’m going to make it something worth inheriting.”
Charles’s expression finally changed.
Not anger.
Not hatred.
Defeat.
But the story still wasn’t finished.
Because three days later, Naomi walked into Claire’s hospital room with a sealed envelope.
“It was recovered from Victor Vale’s private safe.”
Dominic stared.
Claire opened it.
May you like
Inside was a letter from Anne.
And the first sentence changed everything Claire thought she knew about Dominic’s family.
