Chapter 12 - THE PRICE OF POWER
Daniel Mercer had worked for my father for twenty-two years.
He had taught me how to drive.
Helped me get into college without using my father's name.
Once flew across the country because I called him crying after my first serious breakup.
He wasn't an employee.
He was family.
Voss knew that.
The message arrived thirty seconds later.
ONE DRIVE. ONE MERCER.
Agent Shaw read it.
“He's separating the leverage.”
My father was being treated for a graze wound near his ribs.
He looked furious.
“I want every road closed.”
Shaw shook her head.
“If Voss has people inside law enforcement, visible roadblocks could tip him off.”
“He already knows we're here.”
“He doesn't know what we know.”
Selene pointed at the burner phone.
“I can contact him.”
Everyone turned.
“He still thinks I'm working for him.”
I stared at her.
“Are you?”
She looked at me.
“No.”
“Why should I believe that?”
“Because Julian was supposed to become expendable after the Horizon acquisition.”
Julian shouted from twenty feet away.
“What?”
Nobody had noticed he was close enough to hear.
Selene looked at him.
Vicious satisfaction crossed her face.
“You thought Voss was going to make you untouchable?”
Julian stood despite the agents holding him.
“Selene.”
“He was going to bury you.”
“You're lying.”
“He needed your company for the acquisition.”
“Shut up.”
“Once the patents moved and the money cleared, you became the easiest man to blame.”
Julian went silent.
Selene smiled.
“For once, congratulations. You weren't the smartest man in the room.”
He lunged.
Agents forced him down.
I felt no satisfaction.
Only exhaustion.
This wasn't about humiliation anymore.
Daniel was missing.
My mother's death was tied to Voss.
My father had nearly been killed.
I looked at Selene.
“Text him.”
“What do I say?”
“Tell him you have the real drive.”
My father immediately objected.
“Elena—”
I held up my hand.
“Tell him you took it from me during the shooting.”
Selene typed.
Three dots appeared almost instantly.
Then Voss replied.
PROVE IT.
Daniel opened my mother's files often enough that I remembered one document name.
“Tell him Margaret's folder contains Blue Lantern.”
Selene sent it.
The answer took less than ten seconds.
LOCATION COMING.
Shaw exhaled.
“He bought it.”
Then a second message appeared.
COME ALONE. IF MARLOWE'S DAUGHTER FOLLOWS, MERCER DIES.
Selene looked at me.
“He knows you.”
I looked toward the dark river.
“No.”
I took the burner from her hand.
“He knows the woman I've been pretending to be.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we're going to introduce him to the real one.”
My father watched me.
“Elena, what are you planning?”
I opened the maps application.
The location Voss had sent was an abandoned freight terminal outside the city.
I recognized the property.
Marlowe Capital had financed its redevelopment.
Which meant I knew something Voss didn't.
There was an underground service tunnel connecting the terminal to a neighboring warehouse.
I looked at Shaw.
“How fast can your team move without being seen?”
She smiled.
“Fast enough.”
Twenty minutes later, Selene drove toward the terminal alone.
At least that was what Malcolm Voss believed.
I was already underneath him.
May you like
And then I heard Daniel screaming.
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