Chapter 3 - The Woman in the Smoke
Elena ran toward the voice before anyone could stop her.
Caleb caught her arm.
“You’ll get yourself killed.”
“My daughter is in there!”
Gideon slammed his palm against his wheelchair.
“Get her out!”
Two guards entered the smoky service corridor. Seconds later one
returned carrying Lucy.
She was coughing but unharmed.
Elena dropped to her knees and crushed her daughter against her chest.
“Never do that again.”
“But the lady—”
“I don’t care about the lady.”
“She saved me.”
Elena froze.
Lucy pointed toward the smoke.
“She pulled me away from the garage.”
Firefighters arrived quickly. The blaze was contained to a storage area,
but someone had deliberately poured accelerant across old accounting
boxes.
By midnight the mansion smelled of wet ash.
Lucy sat wrapped in a blanket beside the Christmas tree drinking cocoa.
Gideon watched her.
“You frightened everyone.”
“I got lost.”
“You ignored your mother.”
Lucy looked ashamed.
“Yes.”
“Don’t do it again.”
“Okay.”
Then she studied him.
“You were scared.”
Gideon glanced away.
“Of the fire.”
“No. For me.”
Elena expected him to deny it.
He didn’t.
“Yes.”
Lucy seemed satisfied.
“Okay.”
She returned to her marshmallows.
Elena watched Gideon differently after that.
The feared man everyone described was still there, but beneath the anger
lived something grief had not managed to destroy.
Caleb entered with news.
“The woman escaped through the greenhouse.”
“Identification?” Gideon asked.
“No. But we recovered this.”
He placed a silver necklace on the table.
Gideon recognized it immediately.
He had given it to Caroline on their tenth anniversary.
His hand trembled.
Warren stood near the fireplace.
“Someone is playing with you.”
“Maybe.”
“Caroline is dead.”
“I buried a closed coffin.”
Warren went silent.
That sentence changed the room.
Caroline had supposedly died in a private-plane crash over Lake
Superior. Only partial remains were recovered.
Gideon had never viewed her body.
The next morning snow buried the driveway.
Christmas music played softly in the kitchen while Elena made pancakes
for Lucy. Gideon appeared in the doorway.
“You cook?”
“I survive.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
“It’s the answer.”
Lucy held up a burned pancake.
“Mom makes Christmas stars.”
Gideon examined the shapeless black object.
“That is not a star.”
“It was before the accident.”
Elena laughed.
Gideon stared at her.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You smiled.”
“I’m allowed.”
“I didn’t say you weren’t.”
“You looked surprised.”
“I haven’t had many cheerful employees lately.”
“Maybe stop frightening them.”
Lucy nodded. “Mom’s right.”
Gideon sighed. “I am outnumbered.”
For twenty minutes they ate like an ordinary family.
Then Caleb arrived carrying a recovered hard drive from the hidden room.
The warmth disappeared.
They gathered in Gideon’s study.
The drive contained records of a scheme involving workers’ compensation
funds. Someone inside Cross Freight had redirected millions from injured
employees into shell companies.
Daniel had discovered it.
Caroline had helped him collect evidence.
Gideon stared at the screen.
“My company stole from injured workers.”
“Your company,” Elena said. “Did you?”
“No.”
“Then who signed these?”
Caleb enlarged the authorization.
The signature looked like Gideon’s.
He swore.
“That isn’t mine.”
Warren leaned over the desk.
“It looks exactly like yours.”
“That is the point.”
Elena remembered Daniel coming home late in December three years
earlier, pale and distracted.
He had told her someone was stealing from people who could least afford
it.
She had thought he meant a customer.
Now she understood.
“He knew.”
Gideon looked at her.
“Yes.”
“And somebody killed him.”
“We don’t know that.”
“I do.”
Her voice cracked.
“My husband died when his brakes failed on an icy road. The mechanic
told police a line had ruptured. Daniel had checked those brakes two
days earlier.”
Warren said, “You’re connecting unrelated events.”
Elena turned.
“Like the payment you received after his funeral?”
Warren’s face hardened.
Before he could answer, Lucy entered carrying a red ornament.
“Mom?”
Elena immediately softened.
“What happened?”
“This fell.”
She handed Elena the ornament.
Something rattled inside.
Gideon took it.
The ornament was old, hand-painted, one Caroline had owned.
He unscrewed the metal cap.
A tiny memory card slid into his palm.
Warren stopped breathing.
Gideon noticed.
“So you do recognize something.”
“No.”
“You’re a terrible liar when you’re afraid.”
Caleb inserted the card into a secure laptop.
One video file appeared.
Christmas Eve, 2019.
Caroline sat in the hidden room.
Daniel stood behind the camera.
“If Gideon sees this,” Caroline said, “then Warren has already made his
move.”
Warren lunged for the laptop.
Caleb shoved him back.
On-screen Caroline continued.
“The stolen money is only part of it. Someone has been creating
life-insurance policies on employees without their knowledge.”
Elena’s blood went cold.
Daniel stepped into frame.
Including me.”
Caroline nodded.
“And if Daniel dies, the beneficiary is a company controlled by—”
The video froze.
File corrupted.
Gideon looked at Warren.
Warren whispered, “This proves nothing.”
Then Lucy, still standing by the door, said:
“Uncle Warren, why is your picture in Daddy’s wallet?”
Elena turned sharply.
Lucy held an old photograph she had taken from a box of Daniel’s
belongings.
Warren and Daniel stood together outside a warehouse.
Between them was a third man.
Gideon recognized him.
His former driver.
The man who had died in the crash that paralyzed him.
May you like
On the back, Daniel had written:
THREE OF US KNOW. ONE OF US WILL BETRAY THE OTHERS.
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