Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN HE TRIED TO FRAME
By midnight, Gabriel’s mansion no longer felt like his.
Every smoke detector, air vent, wall plate and speaker became suspicious.
Rebecca brought in two independent security technicians with no connection to Rowan Freight.
They found the first hidden camera inside a decorative thermostat outside Gabriel’s study.
The second faced his bedroom corridor.
The third watched the kitchen.
The fourth was inside a smoke detector near the staff entrance.
Hannah stared at it.
“He could watch Lucy?”
Gabriel’s expression went flat.
“That camera comes down first.”
Within three hours, they found eleven.
Ten transmitted wirelessly.
One was hardwired behind the old passage.
It had been there for years.
Evan had not merely known about Michael’s hidden room.
He had watched it.
Waiting to see whether Gabriel ever discovered it.
Nolan regained consciousness in a guest bedroom.
His injuries were painful but not life-threatening.
He told Gabriel that Evan called after leaving the mansion and demanded a meeting.
“He asked whether you’d been in the old corridor.”
“What did you say?”
“That I didn’t know what he meant.”
Nolan swallowed.
“He knew I was lying.”
Two men had followed Nolan from the meeting.
He escaped only after abandoning his truck near Lincoln Park and cutting through a row of backyards.
“Why come here?” Rebecca asked.
Nolan looked at Gabriel.
“Because if Cross wants me dead, this is the only house in Chicago where he might hesitate.”
Gabriel hated the truth of it.
He had built his reputation on fear.
For the first time, he was grateful for it.
At seven the next morning, police arrived.
Not because Gabriel had called them.
Because someone had reported theft.
Detective Warren Hale showed Gabriel a photograph.
Cash.
A company access card.
Copies of restructuring documents.
All found inside Hannah Bennett’s employee locker.
Hannah’s face went white.
“That isn’t mine.”
Hale looked uncomfortable.
“Mrs. Bennett—”
“I have never seen that money.”
Gabriel stepped between them.
“She didn’t take it.”
The detective frowned.
“You know that?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Because the theft occurred while Hannah was downstairs with half my kitchen staff.”
Hale glanced at his notes.
“Security records show her access badge entered the upstairs corridor at 1:42 yesterday.”
Gabriel looked at Evan’s cameras lying in evidence bags across the dining table.
Of course.
A second trap.
Evan had created the appearance of Nolan stealing the file.
If Nolan failed, Hannah would become the alternative suspect.
Why Hannah?
Gabriel looked toward Lucy.
Because Lucy had seen too much.
Evan was not merely protecting himself.
He was attacking the child’s credibility by destroying her mother.
Rebecca approached the detective.
“My client has evidence that the property’s security system was compromised. Mrs. Bennett should not answer additional questions without counsel.”
Hannah stared at Gabriel.
“You’re giving me your attorney?”
“Yes.”
“I can’t afford—”
“You’re not paying her.”
Rebecca sighed.
“Apparently neither is he, given how much unpaid work I’ve done over the years.”
The joke barely moved the tension.
Detective Hale agreed not to arrest Hannah while evidence was reviewed.
But before leaving, he said quietly, “Someone went to a lot of trouble to put that money in her locker.”
“I know.”
“Be careful, Rowan.”
Gabriel almost told him it was fourteen years too late.
Instead, he nodded.
Afterward, Hannah went into the laundry room.
Gabriel found her sitting on a stool.
She was crying silently.
He stopped at the doorway.
Hannah wiped her face immediately.
“I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not.”
“I don’t need you to see me like this.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re my employer.”
“That became considerably less important yesterday.”
She laughed once, bitterly.
“Easy for you to say. If this goes wrong, you still have lawyers and money and people afraid to cross you. I have Lucy.”
Gabriel said nothing.
Hannah looked at him.
“She already lost her father. I will not let her lose her mother because rich men are fighting over secrets.”
The words struck harder than an insult.
“What happened to her father?”
Hannah hesitated.
“Daniel died when Lucy was three. Drunk driver.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
She looked toward the kitchen.
“Lucy remembers almost nothing about him. Sometimes she asks whether he liked pancakes. Whether he sang in the car. Whether he would have helped with math.”
“What do you tell her?”
“The truth when I know it. Something kind when I don’t.”
Gabriel leaned against the doorframe.
“My father taught me kindness makes people weak.”
Hannah met his eyes.
“Was he happy?”
Gabriel had no answer.
She stood.
“You asked what happens now.”
“Yes.”
“I take Lucy and leave.”
“No.”
Hannah’s expression hardened.
“There it is again.”
“What?”
“The part where you think saying one word makes it law.”
“Evan planted evidence against you. If you leave, you become easier to reach.”
“And staying in the house where he installed eleven cameras is safe?”
Gabriel hated that she was right.
“You won’t stay here.”
“Then where?”
“I have a property in Lake Geneva.”
“No.”
“A secured apartment downtown.”
“No.”
“A house in—”
“Gabriel.”
It was the first time she had used his first name.
He stopped speaking.
“I am not cargo you can relocate.”
The words landed harder than they should have.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Ask.”
Gabriel stared.
Nobody demanded that from him.
Not anymore.
He slowly said, “Hannah, would you let me arrange somewhere safe for you and Lucy until this is over?”
She studied him.
“Somewhere I choose?”
“Yes.”
“And I keep my phone.”
“Yes.”
“And nobody follows Lucy into bathrooms, bedrooms or anywhere else because you call it security.”
“Yes.”
“And you tell me what’s happening.”
Gabriel hesitated.
Hannah raised an eyebrow.
“All right.”
“Then yes.”
Lucy appeared in the doorway holding her backpack.
“Are we moving?”
“Temporarily,” Hannah said.
Lucy looked at Gabriel.
“Are you coming?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I have work.”
She frowned.
“You look tired.”
“I am.”
“You should sleep.”
“Lucy—” Hannah began.
Gabriel shook his head.
“She’s right.”
Lucy stepped closer.
“Mom says when people are tired, they make dumb choices.”
Hannah covered her face.
“I really need to stop talking where she can hear me.”
For the first time in almost twenty-four hours, Gabriel smiled.
A real one.
Lucy noticed.
“You look less scary when you do that.”
“I’ll try not to make a habit of it.”
That afternoon, Hannah selected Rebecca’s sister’s vacant townhome in Evanston.
It was modest.
Private.
And most importantly, unknown to Rowan employees.
Gabriel personally drove Hannah and Lucy there.
Before leaving, Lucy handed him a folded drawing.
“What is it?”
“You.”
Gabriel opened it.
A stick figure in a black suit stood beside a smaller figure wearing a pink dress.
Above them, Lucy had written:
GOOD PEOPLE LISTEN.
Gabriel stared at the words.
“Am I a good person?”
Lucy shrugged.
“Sometimes.”
Hannah tried not to smile.
Gabriel folded the drawing carefully and placed it inside his coat.
When he returned to Chicago, Rebecca was waiting.
She had traced several of Michael’s old invoices.
“Gabriel.”
Something in her voice stopped him.
“What?”
“Atlas Fire Systems never existed.”
“I assumed that.”
“That isn’t the important part.”
She slid a corporate filing across the table.
“The original registered agent was Evan Cross.”
Gabriel looked down.
Rebecca placed another document beside it.
“Three million dollars moved through Atlas during the eighteen months before your brother died.”
Gabriel’s jaw tightened.
“Where did it go?”
“Some overseas. Some into property. But one payment matters more.”
She showed him a transfer dated the morning before Warehouse Twelve burned.
$85,000.
Recipient:
Leonard Vale.
Gabriel knew the name.
Everyone in his old world did.
Vale had been an explosives specialist for the Marconi crew.
He had vanished fourteen years ago.
Three days after Michael’s funeral.
Gabriel lifted his eyes.
Rebecca spoke quietly.
“Your brother’s fire may not have been an accident or gang retaliation.”
Gabriel felt something ancient open inside him.
Rebecca continued.
“It may have been paid for.”
May you like
And the man who paid might have been sitting beside Gabriel at Michael’s funeral.
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