Chapter 5 - THE CRASH WAS ONLY THE BEGINNING
Marlo stared at Elias.
“My rescue?”
The pilot leaned against a crate.
Blood had dried near his temple.
“They knew Ezra had discovered Northstar. Adrian wanted him dead, but not immediately.”
Ezra’s voice was cold.
“Explain.”
“The plane was supposed to ditch near the ferry route.”
“Supposed to?”
“I was ordered to trigger an engine-fire warning, kill communications, and force a water landing.”
Marlo felt sick.
“You deliberately crashed?”
“I tried to make it survivable.”
“What happened to the others?”
Elias looked away.
“The copilot panicked. We struck harder than planned.”
Ezra took one step forward.
“My attorney?”
“Rachel never got out.”
“Thomas?”
“I don’t know.”
Pain flashed across Ezra’s face.
Elias continued quickly.
“The plan was for a recovery team to reach you before official rescue.”
“The men on the ferry.”
“Yes.”
“They were supposed to kill me?”
“No.”
Elias looked toward Marlo.
“They were supposed to find Ezra already alive.”
Silence.
Marlo understood first.
“They wanted witnesses.”
Elias nodded.
“Adrian needed the crash to look like an accident. Ezra survives. He comes ashore injured. Then something happens afterward.”
Ezra’s eyes narrowed.
“What?”
“The rescue team was supposed to take you to St. Vincent.”
Marlo froze.
Her old hospital.
“Why?”
Elias’s face tightened.
“Because Martin Kessler controls people there.”
Ezra whispered:
“A medical death.”
“Yes.”
Complications from drowning.
Aspiration.
Internal injuries.
No investigation into sabotage.
Cleaner than a plane explosion.
Marlo’s skin went cold.
“And me?”
“They didn’t expect you.”
Elias looked at her.
“You reached him before their boat did.”
“So they changed the plan.”
“Yes.”
The threat.
Her old disciplinary file.
The attempt to discredit her.
It all made sense.
Marlo had done more than save Ezra’s life.
She had ruined the second half of the murder plan.
“Why are you telling us this?”
Ezra asked.
Elias laughed bitterly.
“Because Adrian tried to kill me after the crash.”
He pulled his jacket aside.
A bullet had grazed his side.
“He didn’t trust me alive.”
“Smart man.”
Elias almost smiled.
“I suppose.”
Ezra’s expression did not soften.
“You still agreed to sabotage my plane.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“My daughter.”
A familiar answer.
Always family.
Always fear.
“She’s twenty-two. Adrian found out she had a drug problem. He threatened to plant enough evidence to put her away for years.”
Marlo folded her arms.
“So you almost killed five people.”
“I know.”
“That isn’t an excuse.”
“I know.”
Good.
At least he did not ask for forgiveness.
Elias gave Ezra a small storage key.
“Thomas Vick survived.”
Ezra grabbed it.
“What?”
“I saw him exit before the fuselage rolled.”
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
“But he had the audit drive.”
Ezra’s pulse seemed to change.
“The Northstar files.”
“Yes.”
“Where would he go?”
“Rachel told him before the flight that if anything happened, there was a safe location.”
“Where?”
“I never heard.”
Marlo thought about the rescue scene.
One survivor supposedly vanished beneath the water.
She had told the rescue team exactly that.
Maybe she had accidentally hidden Thomas too.
They returned to Marlo’s house before dark.
Someone had been inside.
Drawers open.
Mattress moved.
Theo’s photographs pulled from shelves.
Marlo stopped in the doorway.
“No.”
Ezra moved ahead of her.
“They were looking for something.”
“I don’t have anything.”
Then she saw the kitchen wall.
A photograph of Theo had been removed.
Behind it, written in black marker:
YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED BROKEN.
Marlo stared.
Three years.
Three years of believing the world had destroyed her by accident.
Now someone was furious because she had stood up again.
Ezra tore the message from the wall by ripping away the paper beneath it.
“Pack.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“They know where you live.”
“They already knew.”
“Marlo.”
“This house is all I have.”
“No.”
She turned.
“What?”
Ezra looked directly at her.
“It’s what you have left. That isn’t the same thing.”
The words struck harder than he intended.
She walked into Theo’s bedroom.
It was barely a bedroom anymore.
Boxes.
A small bed she had never removed.
Toy boats on the shelf.
Blue curtains.
She had not slept in the room since the funeral.
Ezra stood in the doorway.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“That was cruel.”
“It was true.”
Marlo picked up Theo’s favorite red sweater.
Six years old forever.
She put it inside a bag.
Then she packed.
Ezra’s safe house was a lake cabin outside Kenosha registered to a company with no obvious Calloway connection.
Nora arrived after midnight.
The moment she saw Ezra, she punched him in the shoulder.
His injured shoulder.
He swore.
“You’re alive.”
“I called you.”
“That is not the same thing.”
Then she hugged him carefully.
Marlo looked away.
Nora noticed.
“You’re Marlo.”
“Yes.”
Nora crossed the room and hugged her too.
Marlo stiffened.
“Thank you for pulling my idiot brother from the ocean.”
“You’re welcome.”
Ezra muttered:
“I am standing here.”
“Unfortunately.”
For the first time in days, Marlo laughed.
It surprised everyone.
Especially her.
Later, Nora spread documents across the dining table.
“Adrian’s moving quickly.”
“How?”
“He petitioned to have you declared legally presumed dead for emergency corporate purposes.”
“He can’t.”
“He can temporarily assume authority under the family continuity agreement.”
Ezra cursed.
“When?”
“Board votes tomorrow at noon.”
“If Adrian controls the company, he destroys Northstar records.”
“He’s already trying.”
Marlo looked at the files.
“Then let him believe Ezra is dead.”
Both siblings turned toward her.
“What?”
“Everyone is chasing evidence right now because they’re afraid he survived.”
She looked at Ezra.
“If the board gives Adrian what he wants, he stops hiding.”
Nora slowly smiled.
Ezra did not.
“You want me to stay dead.”
“For twenty-four hours.”
“Absolutely not.”
Marlo raised an eyebrow.
“You survived a plane crash and hid inside my laundry cart.”
“That does not mean you command me.”
“No. Your current lack of options does.”
Nora coughed to hide a laugh.
Ezra glared at both women.
Marlo continued.
“Let Adrian take control.”
“And?”
“Watch what he does first.”
Nora understood.
“The first transaction.”
“The first server deletion.”
“The first person he calls.”
Ezra looked reluctant.
Which told Marlo the idea was good.
Then Nora’s laptop chimed.
A secure message.
Anonymous.
Three words.
I HAVE THE DRIVE.
Below it:
THOMAS VICK.
Ezra leaned over the screen.
Alive.
Thomas included an address.
A church outside Milwaukee.
And one warning.
DO NOT TRUST NORA.
Silence filled the cabin.
Nora stared at the screen.
Then slowly looked at her brother.
“I swear to God, Ezra—”
He raised one hand.
Marlo looked between them.
The first person Ezra trusted.
His sister.
And now the only other surviving member of the audit team was warning them she was compromised.
Ezra’s face became unreadable.
“Nora.”
She stood.
“You believe him?”
“I don’t know.”
Wrong answer.
Nora’s face hardened.
“Then I’m leaving.”
Marlo stepped between them.
“No one is leaving.”
Both Calloways stared at her.
She held up her hands.
“I spent three years being convicted by people who decided suspicion was evidence.”
That shut them up.
“We verify.”
Ezra looked at her.
“How?”
Marlo stared at Thomas’s message.
“We go to the church.”
Then she looked at Nora.
May you like
“All three of us.”
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