Chapter 8 - FOLLOW THE STARS
Hazel and Iris had invented “follow the stars” when they were five.
Sloan remembered immediately.
Whenever they went somewhere crowded—a fair, a museum, a holiday market—Sloan told them that if they ever got separated, they should leave recognizable clues.
Stars.
Hazel drew them constantly.
Iris noticed patterns.
Together, they turned it into a game.
Now the game might save them.
The first chalk star appeared beneath an overpass.
The second was scratched into dirt beside an abandoned bus stop.
The third was not drawn.
It was a star-shaped sticker stuck to a traffic sign.
“She had those in her backpack,” Sloan said.
FBI teams mapped the trail.
Security cameras showed a gray utility van.
License plate stolen.
The van crossed toward Ballard.
Then disappeared near old industrial warehouses.
Griffin sat inside the command vehicle with Sloan.
He had gone almost completely silent.
That frightened her.
“Talk to me.”
“About what?”
“Anything.”
“I should have taken them to school myself.”
“No.”
“I introduced myself into their lives and within a week—”
“Stop.”
“They were safe for eight years.”
“Richard was watching them for eight years.”
“He didn’t touch them.”
“Because they were useful hidden.”
Griffin closed his eyes.
“If something happens—”
“Nothing is happening.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No.”
She grabbed his hand.
“That’s why we don’t lie to each other about being scared anymore.”
His fingers closed around hers.
“I am terrified.”
“So am I.”
The fourth star appeared on a security camera.
Hazel drew it on a dusty van window while whoever held them stopped for fuel.
The camera also caught part of a man’s face.
Cameron recognized him.
“Wesley Pike.”
“Who?” Griffin asked.
“Former Drake Applied security contractor.”
“Richard’s?”
“Yes.”
Agents located Pike’s old company property.
A decommissioned marine-research warehouse near the canal.
They surrounded it.
No immediate entry.
Thermal cameras detected four people inside.
Two child-sized.
Sloan nearly collapsed with relief.
“Alive?”
Ortiz nodded.
“Moving.”
Griffin stood.
“I’m going in.”
“No.”
“I’m not asking.”
Ortiz stepped closer.
“And I’m not negotiating.”
Richard called again.
This time Griffin answered.
“What?”
“Bring the recorder.”
“You don’t need it anymore.”
“It still matters.”
“The FBI has copies.”
Silence.
That had been a calculated lie.
They had copied the digital contents, but Richard could not know exactly what existed.
“You’re lying.”
“Maybe.”
Richard’s tone sharpened.
“Bring the original to the warehouse. Alone.”
“You’re not there.”
A pause.
Griffin smiled coldly.
That guess landed.
“You sent Pike.”
Richard said nothing.
“You don’t have enough courage to stand beside the men you hire.”
“Bring the recorder.”
“No.”
“Then perhaps Pike becomes nervous.”
Sloan grabbed the phone.
“Richard.”
He became quiet.
“You wanted me afraid for eight years.”
“Sloan—”
“It worked.”
She spoke slowly.
“You won.”
Griffin stared at her.
“I disappeared. I lied. I raised two children without their father because I believed you were everywhere.”
Silence.
“But you made one mistake.”
“What?”
“You thought frightened meant stupid.”
Richard’s breathing changed.
“The girls left a trail.”
She could almost hear him realize what that meant.
“Pike is surrounded.”
Richard disconnected.
Ortiz’s radio came alive.
“Movement rear entrance.”
Agents moved.
A man emerged from the warehouse.
Not Pike.
Another contractor.
He surrendered.
Then Pike appeared dragging Hazel by the arm.
No weapon visible.
Iris followed.
Sloan stopped breathing.
Hazel looked terrified but upright.
Agents shouted commands.
Pike froze.
His hand moved toward his jacket.
Griffin surged forward.
Three agents restrained him.
Sloan grabbed him too.
“Don’t.”
“That’s my daughter.”
“I know.”
Pike looked around.
He was trapped.
Hazel did something extraordinary.
She stomped directly onto his foot.
Pike instinctively loosened his grip.
Hazel ran.
Iris followed.
Agents tackled Pike before he moved again.
Sloan was out of the vehicle before anyone stopped her.
“Mom!”
Both girls collided with her.
She dropped to the pavement.
Griffin reached them.
Hazel wrapped one arm around him.
Iris grabbed his jacket.
All four sank into one trembling knot.
“You followed the stars,” Iris cried.
“Of course.”
Hazel looked at Griffin.
“Dad, your security people are not very good.”
He laughed and cried at the same time.
“I’ll note the feedback.”
The girls were medically cleared.
No serious injuries.
Pike talked within hours.
Richard paid him through offshore accounts.
He provided one more crucial detail.
Richard was hiding aboard a private yacht registered through a shell company.
The Coast Guard intercepted it before dawn.
Richard was arrested less than forty miles from Seattle.
No grand final confrontation.
No escape.
Just handcuffs.
Griffin watched live footage from the command center.
Richard stepped onto the dock.
He looked smaller than Sloan remembered.
Old.
Wet.
Furious.
Griffin turned away.
“That’s it?”
Ortiz nodded.
“For tonight.”
But the real collapse came the next morning.
Wesley Pike provided messages connecting Richard directly to the twins’ abduction.
Malcolm’s financial ledgers supported fraud charges.
Daniel Cross’s email implicated Richard in witness intimidation.
And the recording from the cabin helped prosecutors reopen Malcolm’s death.
Drake Applied’s board removed Richard unanimously.
The emergency patent sale was canceled.
The twins’ inheritance entered independent protection.
Hazel and Iris were safe.
Sloan should have felt relief.
Instead, she found Griffin sitting alone in the hospital hallway while the girls slept.
“What’s wrong?”
He stared at his hands.
“My father was right.”
“About Richard?”
“About me.”
“What did he say?”
“That I would build something huge because I was terrified of being powerless.”
Sloan sat beside him.
“He knew you.”
“He also thought children would fix me.”
“They’re not tools.”
“I know.”
He looked toward their room.
“I don’t want them to fix anything.”
“Good.”
“I want to know them.”
Sloan swallowed.
“You will.”
“And you?”
“What about me?”
“Are you going to disappear when this ends?”
There it was.
The question beneath everything.
Sloan looked at him.
“No.”
“Because of the girls?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
She took a long breath.
“Because I’m tired of confusing running away with protecting people.”
Griffin’s eyes held hers.
“And us?”
“I don’t know.”
He nodded.
That answer hurt.
But he accepted it.
Sloan leaned closer.
“I know I still love you.”
His eyes closed.
“Those are extremely different sentences.”
“I know.”
He almost smiled.
“Then maybe we start there.”
And for the first time in nearly a decade, neither of them asked the future to promise anything.
May you like
They simply agreed to be there when morning came.
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