Chapter 19 - Plan B
I did not sleep.
Our son did.
Apparently he had better judgment.
We named him Noah.
Not Victor.
Not Michael.
Not anyone from a trust document.
Noah.
A new name.
A clean start, if such a thing existed.
Federal agents traced Charles’s message to a private number registered through six shell companies.
At noon, they found the owner.
Dr. Samuel Kent.
The old man who had supposedly confessed everything.
Adrian stared at the report.
“He played us.”
Michael shook his head.
“Or Charles used his identity.”
Cassandra looked at me.
“He knew about Plan B.”
The phrase made my skin crawl.
Victor ordered a team to return to the Vermont facility.
Kent was gone.
His bed was empty.
The staff claimed two federal officers had transferred him.
There had been no transfer.
At 2:00 p.m., the hospital went into lockdown again.
This time, no alarm.
Just quiet security.
A federal prosecutor entered my room carrying a paper folder.
“We found what Plan B means.”
Adrian closed the door.
The prosecutor sat.
“Charles created a second guardianship trigger.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Of course he did.”
“It does not involve the baby.”
I stopped smiling.
“It involves you.”
He opened the folder.
A life-insurance policy.
Fifty million dollars.
Insured: Emily Hart Cole.
Beneficiary: Hart-Cole Foundation Trust.
Adrian’s face hardened.
“Who bought this?”
“When?”
Before we met.
I looked at Michael.
“Yes.”
I stared at him.
“My father was a high-school teacher.”
“No.”
Everyone looked at her.
She whispered, “Your father was your father.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Michael stood.
“His name was Daniel Hartwell.”
Michael had.
“One of the original partners in the Cole family trust.”
He chose me because my bloodline carried dormant voting rights.
And my death would have made Charles’s trusteeship stronger.
The prosecutor nodded.
The door opened.
I looked at the cup.
She smiled.
“What’s your name?”
The tray slipped from her hands.
The woman ran.
The syringe hit the tile and cracked.
Then at me.
“They caught her!”
Adrian went to the doorway.
Adrian froze.
“She bit into a capsule before we could stop her.”
I looked at Noah.
Then I understood.
Charles had not built a plan.
May you like
He had built a network.
And some of it was still alive.
