Chapter 15 - The Exchange
The exchange was set for midnight at an abandoned Whitmore hotel construction site on the lakefront.
Marcus wanted police involved.
I agreed.
I also knew Rebecca would be watching for them.
So we gave her what she expected.
I arrived alone.
At least, that was how it looked.
The ledger was in a leather bag.
The deed transfer papers were in another.
Neither was real.
The site was a skeleton of steel and concrete, abandoned after financing collapsed. Wind pushed through open floors.
Rebecca stood beneath a work light.
Grant sat ten feet away, wrists tied to a chair.
His face was bruised but he was conscious.
When he saw me, he laughed weakly. “Of course it’s you.”
Rebecca held a gun at her side.
“You came.”
“You knew I would.”
“I knew Margaret raised you to confuse loyalty with responsibility.”
She nodded toward the bag. “Put it down.”
I did.
“Let Grant go.”
Grant looked at me. “Do not give her anything.”
Rebecca struck him across the face with the back of her hand.
“Still arrogant.”
I stepped forward. “Rebecca.”
The gun lifted toward me.
I stopped.
“You framed Daniel,” I said.
“Yes.”
“You used my mother’s identity.”
“Yes.”
“You tried to run us down in the garage.”
“No.”
That answer surprised me.
Rebecca smiled. “You still think there is only one villain in your story.”
My skin went cold.
She kicked the leather bag toward herself.
“Open it,” I said.
She did.
Blank paper.
Her face changed.
At the same moment, floodlights exploded across the site.
Police shouted from multiple directions.
Rebecca grabbed Grant by the collar and pulled him up, gun against his neck.
“Back off!”
Officers froze.
Daniel stepped out from behind a concrete column despite Marcus trying to stop him.
Rebecca stared at him.
“Thomas’s sons,” she said. “One raised rich. One raised angry. He ruined both of you before either of you could speak.”
Grant’s eyes met Daniel’s.
For the first time, there was no rivalry in them.
Only fear.
Then a shot cracked from somewhere above us.
Rebecca jerked.
The gun fell from her hand.
Chaos erupted.
Police rushed forward.
Marcus pulled me down.
Rebecca was alive, hit in the shoulder.
But the shot had not come from police.
A figure ran along the third-floor walkway.
Grant shouted one name.
“Dad?”
Everyone froze.
May you like
Thomas Whitmore had been dead for eleven years.
Apparently, he had not received the news.
