Chapter 7 - WHY RICHARD LET THEM LIVE IN PEACE
Samuel Cross had died four years earlier.
Officially, heart failure.
Daniel was missing.
Richard denied any relationship to either man beyond old professional connections.
The FBI did not believe him.
Neither did Griffin.
Investigators reconstructed the twins’ birth records.
Samuel Cross had accessed Sloan’s hospital file six times.
He ordered duplicate footprints.
Copied cord-blood information.
And performed an unauthorized paternity-related genetic screening.
Sloan stared at the report.
“He tested them?”
“Yes,” Agent Lena Ortiz said.
“Without my permission?”
“Yes.”
Griffin’s voice turned cold.
“So Richard knew they were mine.”
“Within seventy-two hours of birth.”
Hazel and Iris were upstairs.
Sloan was grateful.
“Then why not challenge the trust?”
Ortiz slid another document across the table.
“Because the trust had another condition.”
Naomi read it.
Then looked at Griffin.
“What?”
Griffin demanded.
“The children do not receive controlling voting rights until their tenth birthday.”
Sloan frowned.
“They’re eight.”
“Yes.”
“Richard had time.”
“Exactly.”
Griffin understood first.
“He didn’t need them gone.”
Naomi nodded.
“He needed them hidden.”
The room became silent.
If Richard publicly acknowledged Hazel and Iris existed, the trust would activate legal protections.
But as long as no one knew, Richard could quietly restructure Drake Applied.
Sell assets.
Transfer patents.
Strip value.
He had spent eight years using the twins’ invisibility to dismantle what they would eventually own.
Sloan felt rage rise.
“My silence helped him.”
Griffin looked at her.
“He designed it that way.”
“I still helped.”
“He threatened you specifically because he needed you quiet.”
“But I stayed quiet.”
“Yes.”
His voice softened.
“And now you’re not.”
Forensic accountants found billions in intellectual-property transfers routed through entities controlled by Richard.
The girls’ inheritance had been hollowed out piece by piece.
Then investigators found something worse.
A planned transaction.
Scheduled three months from now.
The sale of the company’s most valuable patent portfolio to a private foreign consortium.
Once completed, recovering the assets would become difficult.
Richard had only needed Hazel and Iris hidden until the sale closed.
Hazel’s emergency phone call destroyed eight years of planning.
“He must hate her,” Sloan whispered.
Griffin looked toward the ceiling.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because men like Richard don’t hate people.”
His expression went distant.
“They hate obstacles.”
Daniel Cross was located the next day in Vancouver.
Not arrested.
Dead.
An apparent suicide inside a hotel.
Sloan stared at the news.
“No.”
Agent Ortiz agreed.
“Canadian authorities have concerns.”
Daniel left behind one email scheduled to send after his death.
It arrived in Griffin’s inbox.
I DID WHAT RICHARD ASKED FOR TOO LONG. IF HE THINKS I TALKED, I AM ALREADY DEAD. MALCOLM’S ORIGINAL RECORDING IS IN THE PLACE GRIFFIN REFUSED TO SELL.
Griffin knew immediately.
“My father’s cabin.”
A small property on Whidbey Island.
Worth almost nothing compared with Griffin’s other real estate.
He had refused to sell because it was where Malcolm taught him to fish.
Federal agents searched it.
Behind an old stone fireplace, they found a waterproof container.
Inside:
A recorder.
Three ledgers.
And Malcolm’s final will.
The recording was brutal.
Malcolm confronted Richard.
“You stole from the company.”
Richard’s younger voice answered.
“I moved capital.”
“You stole.”
“You’re going to destroy everything over accounting?”
“I’m removing you.”
A chair scraped.
Then Richard said:
“You think Griffin will stop me?”
“He won’t need to.”
“What does that mean?”
“My grandchildren will.”
Richard laughed.
“Griffin doesn’t have children.”
“He might someday.”
“And you built a company around hypothetical babies?”
“I built protection around the only thing you can’t manufacture.”
“What?”
“A future you don’t control.”
The recording ended before any explicit threat.
But the ledgers documented fraud.
Enough for charges.
Then Malcolm’s will revealed one last surprise.
If Richard materially interfered with the descendant trust, every disputed voting share automatically transferred into a nonprofit foundation until Griffin’s children turned twenty-five.
Richard could never control them.
Never.
Griffin laughed when Naomi explained it.
“My father knew him.”
Sloan smiled sadly.
“Apparently.”
The FBI prepared arrest warrants.
Richard vanished six hours before they reached his Bellevue estate.
His private jet remained grounded.
Passport unused.
Vehicle abandoned near the waterfront.
“He knows the area,” Griffin said.
“So do you,” Ortiz replied.
Sloan’s phone rang.
Blocked number.
Everyone looked at her.
Ortiz signaled.
Answer.
Sloan pressed speaker.
Richard’s voice.
“Sloan.”
Her stomach tightened.
“Where are you?”
“You finally stopped running.”
“Funny coming from you.”
He chuckled.
“I always liked that about you.”
“You threatened babies.”
“I protected a company.”
“They were babies.”
“They were paperwork with heartbeats.”
Griffin’s expression changed.
Sloan saw murder in his eyes and understood why Eleanor Drake had once been afraid of what Griffin would do if he knew too soon.
Sloan continued.
“What do you want?”
“The recorder.”
“No.”
“Then I suppose Griffin will lose something else.”
Griffin stepped forward.
“What?”
Richard heard him.
“Ah. There you are.”
“What did you do?”
Richard became quiet.
Then he said:
“Ask your security chief.”
Everyone turned toward Cameron Vale.
Cameron’s face went white.
His phone vibrated.
He checked it.
“Hazel and Iris.”
Sloan’s heart stopped.
“What?”
“The school transport.”
Cameron called his team.
No answer.
He pulled up GPS.
The vehicle had stopped moving nine minutes earlier.
Three miles from the secure residence.
Griffin grabbed his coat.
Ortiz blocked him.
“Wait.”
“My daughters are missing.”
“We don’t know that yet.”
Sloan’s phone remained connected.
Richard whispered:
“You wanted the truth.”
Her hands shook.
“You have them?”
“No.”
A pause.
“Not yet.”
The line went dead.
The FBI reached the vehicle eleven minutes later.
The driver and security officer were alive.
Sedated.
The rear door stood open.
Two backpacks lay on the road.
No twins.
Then Sloan saw something on the photograph sent from the scene.
Hazel’s purple hair tie.
Placed carefully on the curb.
Beside it, written in sidewalk chalk:
IRIS SAYS FOLLOW THE STARS.
Sloan looked at Griffin.
The girls had not simply been taken.
May you like
They were leaving a trail.
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