Chapter 8 - THE RIVER TERMINALAt 8:57 p.m., I drove through the gates alone.
At least, that was what whoever watched the cameras was supposed to believe.
The abandoned Heartland river terminal looked like a dead industrial city.
Steel loading structures.
Empty warehouses.
Broken sodium lights.
A rusting conveyor tower silhouetted against the winter sky.
The Missouri River moved black beyond the levee.
I parked my old pickup exactly where instructed.
Evelyn’s ledger sat on the passenger seat.
Not the real one.
The FBI had photographed every page.
What I carried was a nearly perfect duplicate assembled that afternoon.
Marcus hated the plan.
Agent Chen hated it more.
But they accepted one fact.
Whoever took Daniel believed I would come.
That gave us leverage.
I stepped out.
The wind cut through my coat.
A phone began ringing inside a small security office.
Old landline.
I entered.
Dust covered the desk.
The phone rang again.
I answered.
“Hello?”
A distorted voice replied.
“Bring the ledger to Warehouse Four.”
“Let me speak to Daniel.”
“Warehouse Four.”
“I want proof he’s alive.”
Silence.
Then Daniel’s voice came through.
“Abe.”
“Daniel.”
“Don’t—”
The line cut.
Alive.
For now.
I walked across the loading yard.
Tiny cameras had been placed near two light poles.
Recent equipment.
Someone was watching.
Warehouse Four stood near the river side.
One door was open.
Inside, a single work lamp illuminated an empty table.
I placed the ledger on it.
“Here.”
No answer.
Then a voice came from behind me.
“You always were stubborn.”
Dr. Peter Nolan stepped from the shadows.
He wore a dark winter coat.
No medical authority now.
No polished hospital smile.
Just a tired man holding a pistol.
“You,” I said.
He looked at the ledger.
“Move away.”
“Where’s my brother?”
“Move.”
I stepped back.
Nolan approached the table.
“Did you kill my wife?”
His hand paused.
“I treated your wife.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
He picked up the ledger.
“You should have let the past stay buried.”
“You poisoned her.”
His face tightened.
“I did what I was told.”
My heart stopped.
Not because I was surprised.
Because hearing it aloud made eleven years of grief change shape in one second.
Evelyn had not simply died.
Someone had taken her.
“Who told you?”
Nolan looked at me.
“You know.”
“Thomas?”
He smiled sadly.
“Thomas thinks he’s smarter than he is.”
“Then who?”
A gunshot exploded.
Nolan jerked.
The pistol fell from his hand.
He collapsed against the table.
I dove behind a steel pillar.
Another shot shattered the work lamp.
Darkness swallowed the warehouse.
A voice shouted from somewhere above.
“Get the book!”
Footsteps ran across metal stairs.
Nolan groaned.
I crawled toward him.
“Who?” I whispered.
His coat was darkening at the shoulder.
“Who ordered Evelyn’s death?”
He looked at me.
Fear filled his face.
Then he whispered two words.
“Her brother.”
I froze.
“Evelyn didn’t have a brother.”
Nolan gave a weak, desperate laugh.
Then more gunfire erupted.
FBI agents shouted.
“Federal agents! Drop the weapon!”
The warehouse exploded into movement.
Flashlights.
Boots.
Metal clanging.
Someone ran through the rear exit.
Marcus’s voice came through the tiny receiver hidden beneath my collar.
“Abe, stay down!”
I stayed beside Nolan.
“Explain.”
He was fading.
“Not… her brother.”
“What?”
“Thomas’s.”
Then his eyes rolled back.
Paramedics would later save him.
But before I could ask more, Marcus reached me.
“Move!”
He dragged me behind cover as another round struck the pillar.
Agent Chen’s team pursued the shooter toward the levee.
Two minutes later, we heard shouting.
Then silence.
“Suspect down!” someone called.
Alive.
The shooter was arrested near an old loading crane.
His name was Jeffrey Bell.
Thomas Bell’s younger brother.
Nolan’s words finally made sense.
Thomas’s brother.
Jeffrey.
Fifty-four.
Former private security contractor.
No official connection to Heartland.
At least none we knew about.
Inside his jacket were three burner phones.
One contained messages to Alicia Grant, the fake nurse who tried to kill Wyatt.
Another contained photos of Daniel entering a motel two days earlier.
The third contained a list.
Names.
Payments.
Dates.
At the bottom was one line from eleven years ago.
E.Y. – COMPLETE – $250,000.
My knees almost failed.
E.Y.
Evelyn Yates.
Complete.
Paid.
Marcus saw it over my shoulder.
He said nothing.
He did not need to.
We found Daniel twenty minutes later in the underground maintenance tunnel.
Alive.
Bruised.
Dehydrated.
Furious.
When they cut the restraints, he shoved away the paramedic and looked at me.
“You brought the ledger?”
“A copy.”
For the first time in our lives, Daniel looked impressed.
“Maybe you’re not completely stupid.”
I almost hit him.
Instead, I hugged him.
He stiffened.
Then slowly wrapped one arm around me.
We had not hugged since our mother died.
When we separated, I said, “You have a lot to answer for.”
“I know.”
“You helped them steal from me.”
“I know.”
“You helped Sabrina get close to Wyatt?”
His face changed.
“No.”
“What?”
“I never met Sabrina until after she married him.”
“Thomas said—”
“Thomas lies.”
“Then how did Irving fit?”
Daniel sat on a crate.
“Evelyn found Irving first. He was moving money through real-estate partnerships. Thomas was paying him.”
“Why?”
“Thomas needed someone outside Heartland.”
“And you?”
“I spent years trying to prove you cheated me. Then Thomas approached me.”
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
“After Sabrina married Wyatt?”
“Yes.”
“What did he offer?”
“Twenty percent of Heartland after restructuring.”
“In exchange for?”
“Helping challenge your control if you died or became incompetent.”
I stared.
“You agreed?”
“Yes.”
At least he did not lie.
“I was angry.”
“You were willing to steal my company.”
“Yes.”
“But not kill Wyatt.”
“No.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because if I wanted Wyatt dead, I wouldn’t have called you.”
Fair.
Painful.
But fair.
Agent Chen entered the tunnel.
“We found something else.”
She handed me a phone recovered from Jeffrey Bell.
A photograph filled the screen.
Sabrina.
Not current.
Much younger.
Perhaps twenty-two.
Standing beside Thomas Bell at a charity gala.
The timestamp was nine years old.
Wyatt met Sabrina six years ago.
She had known Thomas for three years before she ever “accidentally” met my son at a restaurant in St. Louis.
Agent Chen swiped.
Another photograph.
Thomas.
Sabrina.
Irving.
Peter Nolan.
All together.
Seven years ago.
I felt sick.
Wyatt’s marriage had never been random.
Sabrina had not married into the conspiracy.
She had been part of it before she met him.
Then Daniel looked at the image and whispered:
“Oh, hell.”
“What?”
He pointed at someone in the background.
A woman with silver-blonde hair.
Elegant.
Half turned away from the camera.
“Who is she?”
Daniel stared at me.
“You really don’t recognize her?”
I looked closer.
Then my chest tightened.
I did.
Margaret Vale.
Evelyn’s closest friend.
The woman who sat beside me at my wife’s funeral.
The woman Wyatt called Aunt Margaret.
The woman who had managed the Yates Family Trust for twenty years.
The woman who controlled the legal paperwork protecting my seventy-two percent ownership.
I stared at her face.
If Margaret was involved—
May you like
They had never needed to steal Heartland from the outside.
They already had someone holding the keys.
