Chapter 6 - The Man Who Followed Ethan

Nathan knew the name before Margaret said it.

Caleb Voss.

Former military police. Former head of security for Ashford Holdings. The kind of man who never appeared in photographs unless someone else had made a mistake.

"Voss disappeared after Ethan's funeral," Nathan said.

Margaret nodded. "Your father paid him two hundred thousand dollars three days later."

Grace stared at her. "For what?"

"He claimed it was severance."

Nathan laughed once. "Dad didn't pay severance in cash."

The next morning, Nathan called a private investigator named Maya Ortiz, a former federal agent who had once handled due diligence for him.

He gave her the plate number, Ethan's accident report, and the old payment records.

Maya called back before noon.

"Your brother's rental car didn't just go through a guardrail," she said. "The brake line had been cut."

Nathan gripped the phone. "The report said mechanical failure."

"The original mechanic wrote 'deliberate damage.' That line was removed from the final report."

"By whom?"

"The sheriff who signed it retired six months later. His mortgage was paid off by a company linked to Ashford Holdings."

Nathan looked through the glass doors at Grace and Lily in the garden. Lily was picking dead leaves from a rose bush while Grace watched her.

"Find Voss."

"I'm already looking."

By afternoon, the estate felt less like a home and more like a bunker. Nathan changed access codes, hired outside security, and moved Grace and Lily into the guest suite closest to his room.

Grace objected.

"I don't want protection that feels like a cage."

"Then call it a locked door between you and a woman who hit you with a hockey stick."

"Fair."

For the first time, Nathan almost smiled.

Then Lily wandered in carrying a small wooden horse she had found in a cabinet.

Nathan froze.

Ethan had carved that horse when he was sixteen.

"Where did you get that?"

"Grandma Margaret gave it to me."

Grace's expression sharpened. "She did what?"

Lily turned the horse over.

Something rattled inside.

Nathan pried open a loose wooden plug beneath one hoof.

A tiny memory card slid into his palm.

Grace whispered, "Ethan."

Nathan inserted it into his laptop.

There was one video file.

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Ethan appeared on the screen, alive, frightened, and looking directly into the camera.

"If Nathan is watching this," he said, "then Richard knows I found the second ledger."