Chapter 3 - THE RED BOOKThe first attacker came through the broken door carrying a suppressed handgun.
Grant fired before the man could lift it.
One shot.
The attacker dropped.
Claire flinched at the sound.
Grant did not.
A second man appeared behind the first.
Grant pulled Claire toward the side wall as bullets punched through the desk.
Wood exploded.
Claire covered her face.
“Move!”
Grant shoved open a hidden panel beside the bookshelf.
Behind it was a narrow corridor.
Claire stared.
“You have a secret hallway?”
“Complain later.”
Another bullet struck the wall.
Grant pushed her inside and slammed the panel shut.
Emergency lights glowed along the floor.
Claire stumbled after him.
Her ribs screamed.
Her injured shoulder throbbed.
Grant noticed.
“You can walk?”
“Yes.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
“I’m not staying here.”
For some reason, that almost made him smile.
Almost.
They moved through the passage.
Grant pressed a hand to an earpiece Claire had not noticed.
“Mercer to security. Status.”
Static.
Nothing.
Grant’s expression changed.
“They jammed communications.”
“How many people know this passage exists?”
“Three.”
“Let me guess. Two are dead and one is you?”
“One is seventy-three and lives in Arizona.”
“That is somehow not comforting.”
They reached a steel door.
Grant entered a code.
It opened into an underground garage.
Three black SUVs sat beneath bright lights.
Grant walked toward the nearest one.
Claire stopped.
“My apartment.”
“No.”
“The red book is there.”
“We’re not going anywhere near your apartment.”
“You heard them. They came here for me.”
“Exactly.”
“If they know about the book—”
“They don’t.”
“How can you know?”
“Because if they knew, you’d already be dead.”
Claire hated that the logic made sense.
Grant opened the passenger door.
“We leave the city first.”
“No.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Claire.”
“You spent five years hiding the truth from me. You don’t get to start giving orders now.”
“This is not an accounting meeting.”
“I noticed the gunfire.”
Grant stepped closer.
“Those men came through twelve million dollars of private security like they had the floor plan.”
“Which means you have a leak.”
“Yes.”
“And if we run to one of your other safe houses, whoever leaked this address will leak that one.”
His jaw tightened.
Claire pointed toward the garage exit.
“My apartment is exactly where everyone expects me not to go.”
“That is a terrible plan.”
“It’s also our only clue.”
Grant stared at her.
Claire stared back.
Finally he cursed quietly.
“Get in.”
Fifteen minutes later they were driving south through the rain.
Grant had switched vehicles twice.
Claire wore one of his oversized black coats over her hospital clothing.
The city moved past in wet streaks of light.
She kept thinking about her father.
Michael Bennett had taught her arithmetic at the kitchen table.
He had packed ridiculous notes in her school lunches.
He had danced badly to Motown while washing dishes.
Nothing about him had seemed secretive.
But memory changed under suspicion.
The locked toolbox he never allowed her to touch.
The phone calls he took outside.
The week before his death when he made Claire promise that if anything ever happened, she would “trust numbers before people.”
At sixteen, she had thought it was one of his strange life lessons.
Now she understood.
“Grant.”
“Yes.”
“What exactly happened the night my father died?”
His hands tightened on the wheel.
“A warehouse burned.”
“I know the newspaper version.”
“Your father had contacted mine three days earlier. He claimed he had obtained proof tying Daniel Vale personally to Blackstone transfers.”
“The ledger?”
“Maybe.”
“What happened?”
“My father arranged a meeting at the warehouse.”
“With Michael?”
“Yes.”
“Did he show up?”
Grant looked ahead.
“My father did.”
“And?”
“He found the building already burning.”
Claire swallowed.
“Was there a body?”
“No.”
“But they declared him dead.”
“Based on dental fragments and personal effects.”
Claire slowly turned.
“Dental fragments?”
“Yes.”
“My father had dental surgery six months earlier.”
Grant looked at her.
“What kind?”
“A crown.”
His expression sharpened.
“Claire.”
She understood immediately.
If someone had access to discarded dental material—
“No.”
Grant said nothing.
“No. You’re not saying he might be alive.”
“I’m saying we never saw a body.”
Hope was crueler than grief.
Claire looked away.
“I buried him.”
“I know.”
“I watched my mother put his wedding ring in an empty coffin.”
Grant’s voice softened.
“I know.”
“Don’t give me hope unless you have something real.”
“I won’t.”
They reached her neighborhood thirty minutes later.
Claire lived in a modest brick building near Lincoln Square.
Grant parked two blocks away.
“No lights.”
Claire nodded.
They approached through an alley.
Her apartment door looked untouched.
Grant checked the frame.
“No forced entry.”
“Maybe we’re early.”
“Maybe.”
He drew his gun.
Claire unlocked the door.
The apartment was dark.
Everything looked normal.
Her blue couch.
The coffee mug she had left in the sink.
The stack of mail on the counter.
Then Claire noticed the photograph above the bookshelf.
It was crooked.
She never left it crooked.
“Someone’s been here.”
Grant saw her expression.
“Where’s the book?”
“Bedroom closet.”
He went first.
The closet door was open.
Boxes had been moved.
Claire dropped to her knees.
She pulled out a cardboard carton labeled MOM.
Inside were photographs, recipes, tax documents, Christmas cards.
At the bottom was the old red accounting book.
Claire lifted it.
The cover was cracked.
Her father’s handwriting filled the first pages.
Household expenses.
Mortgage.
Groceries.
Claire almost laughed from the absurdity.
“This is it?”
Grant crouched beside her.
She flipped pages.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Then the last entry.
Books are closed.
Claire touched the words.
Below them was a row of numbers.
17-4-2-19-11.
Grant frowned.
“Code?”
Claire stared.
“No.”
“What?”
“I know these numbers.”
She went to the bookshelf.
Pulled down five books.
Her father had labeled almost everything when she was young.
Book seventeen.
Page four.
Second word.
Then nineteen.
Eleventh.
Claire opened each.
The words formed:
LOOK BENEATH YOUR FIRST BALANCE.
Claire froze.
“My first balance.”
Grant looked around.
“Meaning?”
“When I was ten, my dad taught me double-entry bookkeeping.”
She went to a small wooden frame hanging near the desk.
Inside was the first balance sheet she had ever made.
Childish handwriting.
Allowance: twelve dollars.
Expenses: nine.
Remaining: three.
Michael had framed it as a joke.
Claire took it down.
The back felt thicker than she remembered.
Grant handed her a knife.
She cut through the paper backing.
A small brass key fell into her palm.
Both of them stared.
“No ledger,” Claire whispered.
Grant picked up the key.
“Safe-deposit box.”
“Maybe.”
A noise came from the hallway.
Grant shut off the lamp.
Footsteps.
Someone stopped outside the apartment.
Claire’s heart hammered.
The doorknob turned.
Grant aimed.
A woman’s voice came through the door.
“Claire?”
Claire went still.
She knew that voice.
Her downstairs neighbor.
Mrs. Alvarez.
“Claire, honey? Are you home?”
Grant lowered the gun slightly.
Claire opened the door.
Mrs. Alvarez stood in a robe.
She was seventy-two and looked furious.
“Oh, thank God.”
“What happened?”
“A man was asking about you.”
Grant’s attention sharpened.
“What man?”
Mrs. Alvarez looked at him suspiciously.
“Who are you?”
“My boss.”
She examined Grant’s expensive coat.
“You don’t look like an accountant.”
Claire almost smiled.
“When?”
“Maybe two hours ago.”
“What did he look like?”
“Older. Gray hair. Limp.”
Claire’s smile vanished.
Mrs. Alvarez continued.
“He said he was your uncle.”
“I don’t have an uncle.”
“I know. That’s why I told him to go to hell.”
Grant stepped closer.
“What did he ask?”
Mrs. Alvarez reached into her robe pocket.
“He wanted me to give you this.”
She held out an envelope.
Claire took it.
Her name was written across the front.
The handwriting struck her like lightning.
She had seen it on birthday cards.
Permission slips.
Lunch notes.
Her entire childhood.
CLAIRE.
Her hand began to shake.
Grant saw.
“What?”
She opened the envelope.
Inside was one sentence.
Do not trust Arthur Mercer’s son.
Claire read it twice.
Grant’s face went blank.
Mrs. Alvarez looked between them.
“Everything okay?”
No.
Nothing was okay.
Because Arthur Mercer’s son was standing beside Claire.
Grant.
May you like
And the handwriting belonged to a man who had been dead for twelve years.
Her father.
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