Chapter 9 - The Dollar Bill
Police found Marco’s abandoned SUV twenty miles north.
No Mia.
Elena nearly tore the door off herself.
Her daughter’s pink sweater lay on the back seat.
“Mia!”
Damian caught Elena before she ran into traffic.
“She isn’t here.”
“Then where is she?”
Marco’s phone was found crushed beside the road.
But inside the vehicle, detectives discovered something strange.
A child’s crumpled dollar bill.
Elena picked it up.
Her hands shook.
“She had this in her pocket.”
Damian stared at it.
Mia had left it behind deliberately.
A clue.
“She’s smart.”
Elena started crying.
“She’s three.”
Damian crouched in front of her.
“And she knows her mother is coming.”
Owen found tire marks leading to an old service road.
Police followed them to an abandoned riverside warehouse once owned by a Cross subsidiary.
Inside, they found Marco.
Tied to a chair.
Alive.
Barely conscious.
Elena grabbed him.
“Where is Mia?”
Marco coughed.
“I didn’t take her.”
“The video—”
“Charles called me.”
“He said if I brought Mia, he’d make the custody investigation disappear.”
“You brought her anyway?”
Marco cried.
“I thought he just wanted leverage!”
Elena slapped him.
One sharp crack.
“You used her again.”
Marco lowered his head.
“He took her.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Damian grabbed Marco’s jacket.
“Think.”
Marco’s eyes widened.
“The old house.”
“What old house?”
“Charles kept talking about the lake property.”
Damian released him.
He knew exactly where.
Cross Lake House.
Empty for nine years.
Fifty miles away.
Police surrounded the property before midnight.
Damian and Elena stayed behind the line until an officer shouted.
“Movement upstairs!”
Elena saw a tiny face appear at a second-floor window.
“Mia!”
Mia hit the glass.
“Mama!”
Elena ran.
Damian grabbed her.
“Wait!”
Then Charles appeared behind Mia.
One hand on the little girl’s shoulder.
Not hurting her.
But controlling the room.
He opened the window.
“Damian!”
His voice carried across the dark lawn.
“You want the child?”
“Bring me the ledger.”
Damian stared up.
Charles smiled.
“One book.”
“For one little girl.”
Elena whispered.
“Give it to him.”
Damian looked at her.
“Give him anything.”
He nodded.
Then walked toward the house alone.
But inside his coat wasn’t the ledger.
It was something Charles never expected.
May you like
A live transmitter broadcasting every word directly to federal investigators.
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