Chapter 9 - What Elena KnewWeston’s face became unreadable.
“Mother.”
Evelyn kept the gun aimed at Rafe.
“Move away from Mary.”
Rafe laughed quietly.
“Still dramatic, Evie.”
“Move.”
“You won’t shoot me.”
“I should have done it 30 years ago.”
Mary remained motionless.
Holly could see the child trying not to cry.
Midnight stood outside the carriage house, his shadow moving across the doorway.
Weston’s gun remained trained on Rafe.
But his eyes were on Evelyn.
“What does he mean?”
“Not now.”
“What does he mean?”
Rafe smiled.
“Tell him.”
Evelyn’s jaw tightened.
“I said move away from Mary.”
Rafe took 1 slow step sideways.
Mary immediately ran.
Weston caught her with his free arm and pulled her against him.
The moment she was clear, Tristan appeared behind Evelyn with 3 armed men.
Rafe looked around.
“Family reunion.”
Tristan pointed his gun.
“I liked you better when I thought you were merely annoying.”
“You always lacked imagination.”
Mary buried her face in Weston’s chest.
Holly moved to them.
“Is she hurt?”
“No,” Weston said.
Mary shook her head.
“Midnight bit the man.”
Rafe looked irritated.
“That horse has become a serious inconvenience.”
Holly almost smiled.
Weston handed Mary to Tristan.
“Take her.”
Tristan nodded.
Mary clung to Weston.
“No.”
“Mouse.”
“No!”
He lowered his forehead to hers.
“I need you outside.”
“Are you going to kill Uncle Rafe?”
The question silenced the room.
Weston closed his eyes.
“No.”
Rafe raised an eyebrow.
Weston looked at him.
“Not in front of you.”
Tristan carried Mary outside.
Holly started to follow.
Weston touched her arm.
“Stay.”
She looked at him.
He wanted a witness.
Or an anchor.
Perhaps both.
Evelyn lowered her gun slightly once Mary was gone.
Rafe noticed.
“Still choosing children over truth.”
“Truth is why I came.”
She reached into her coat and removed a sealed envelope.
“Elena gave me 2 things.”
Weston stared.
“The key and this.”
“You said nothing about an envelope.”
“She told me to open it only if Rafe ever used Arthur’s account again.”
Rafe’s smile vanished.
Evelyn looked at him.
“6 weeks ago, you did.”
She handed the envelope to Weston.
Inside was a single page in Elena’s handwriting.
Weston read silently.
His face changed line by line.
Holly watched his fingers tighten.
Finally he looked at his mother.
“You authorized the transfer that paid Rossi before the bombing.”
Evelyn went pale.
“Yes.”
Holly stopped breathing.
Rafe smiled faintly.
Weston’s voice became hollow.
“You paid the man who killed Elena.”
“I did not know.”
“You authorized it.”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“$800,000.”
“For what?”
“I believed it was to extract Tristan from Atlantic City.”
Tristan, standing near the doorway, froze.
“What?”
Evelyn looked at her younger son.
“You had been taken.”
“I was never taken.”
“I received photographs.”
“Mother.”
“Photographs of you tied to a chair. Blood on your face.”
Tristan stared.
“That never happened.”
Rafe began to laugh.
Evelyn turned on him.
“You sent them.”
“Yes.”
“You told me Rossi had Tristan.”
“Yes.”
“You told me the money would buy his life.”
“Yes.”
Weston looked from his mother to Rafe.
“You used her authorization to move money through 4471.”
Rafe nodded.
“Evelyn had the only signature Arthur’s old banking contacts would accept without questions.”
“And you gave the money to Rossi.”
“Yes.”
“For the bomb.”
Rafe’s expression changed.
“No.”
Weston raised his gun higher.
“Careful.”
“I am finished being careful.”
Rafe looked at Holly.
She hated that he kept doing that.
As though she were an audience he wanted to impress.
“The payment purchased Rossi’s silence.”
“About what?” Holly asked.
“Kline.”
“Why?”
“Because Victor had begun blackmailing buyers.”
Rafe sighed.
“He became unstable after the fire. Paranoid. He believed everyone had abandoned him.”
“Kline died in the fire,” Holly said.
“No.”
The word struck her.
“What?”
Rafe smiled without humor.
“Victor Kline survived.”
Holly’s body turned cold.
“No.”
“You saw a body.”
“I saw—”
“You saw a man wearing Kline’s coat.”
Memory broke open.
Flames.
Collapsed roof.
A body near the office.
Police saying Kline had died.
Dental records.
Everything official.
Everything controlled by men with money.
“Where is he?”
Rafe’s expression hardened.
“Rossi killed him 2 years later.”
“Why?”
“Because Victor kept selling copies of Black Crown.”
Weston lowered his gun by an inch.
“So Elena found out.”
“Yes.”
“She contacted Rossi.”
Rafe nodded.
“Without telling you.”
Weston’s face tightened.
“She offered him immunity?”
“No. Elena was not that naïve.”
Rafe looked almost admiring.
“She offered him mutually assured destruction.”
Holly understood.
“Elena had part of the list.”
“Yes.”
“Rossi had part.”
“Yes.”
“Rafe had part.”
“Yes.”
“And Midnight carried Kline’s final copy.”
Rafe nodded.
Weston stared at him.
“Then why did Rossi kill Elena?”
For the first time, Rafe looked uncomfortable.
“He believed she had given his portion to federal investigators.”
“Had she?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I found it after she died.”
Weston stepped forward.
“You searched my dead wife’s things.”
“Yes.”
“What did you find?”
Rafe looked at Evelyn.
“The envelope she left for Evie was not the only one.”
Weston’s hand tightened around his gun.
“Where?”
“Safe deposit box in Manhattan.”
“Contents?”
“Proof.”
“Of what?”
Rafe took a slow breath.
“That Rossi did not order the bombing either.”
Silence.
Holly felt dread rise.
Weston’s voice became almost inaudible.
“Then who did?”
Rafe looked at him.
“The bomb was ordered through Rossi’s organization by someone using his lieutenant.”
“Name.”
“Dante Moretti.”
“Who hired Moretti?”
“An account registered through Hargrove Holdings.”
Weston’s face hardened.
“We know.”
“No.”
Rafe shook his head.
“Not 4471.”
Everyone went still.
“A current account.”
Weston looked at Tristan.
Tristan stared back.
Rafe continued.
“Created 4 months before Elena died.”
“Whose authorization?” Weston asked.
Rafe smiled sadly.
“Yours.”
Weston did not move.
Holly knew enough about forgery to understand before he denied it.
“I never authorized it.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because I forged your signature.”
Tristan lunged.
2 guards caught him before he reached Rafe.
“You son of a—”
“Let him go,” Weston said.
Tristan stopped.
Rafe continued.
“I needed Elena frightened.”
“You ordered the bomb.”
“No.”
“You forged my signature to create the account used to pay for it.”
“Yes.”
“Difference without distinction.”
“There is a difference.”
Rafe’s voice sharpened.
“I transferred $200,000 to Moretti to frighten Elena. Break into her car. Leave a threat. Make her stop investigating.”
Weston’s entire body shook with contained rage.
“What happened?”
“Rossi learned about it.”
“And?”
“He increased the payment.”
Holly understood.
“Rossi turned a threat into a murder.”
Rafe nodded.
Weston closed his eyes.
For 3 years he had thought Rossi murdered Elena because she was Weston Hargrove’s wife.
The truth was worse.
She died because she was close to exposing all of them.
Father.
Uncle.
Mother’s money.
Rossi.
Black Crown.
Every family secret eventually reached her car.
Weston opened his eyes.
“You started it.”
Rafe did not deny it.
“Yes.”
Evelyn lifted her gun.
Rafe looked at her.
“Evie.”
Her hand trembled.
“You used my child.”
“Yes.”
“You used both of them.”
“Yes.”
“You killed Elena.”
“No.”
“You created the road.”
Rafe’s expression changed.
He had no answer.
A gunshot cracked outside.
Everyone moved.
Another shot.
Then automatic fire.
Rafe’s eyes widened.
“That isn’t mine.”
Weston looked at him.
“Rossi.”
The carriage house lights went out.
Men shouted outside.
Glass shattered.
Holly dropped behind a stone trough.
Weston fired through the doorway.
Rafe moved toward a rear exit.
Evelyn aimed at him.
Then a bullet tore through the wall.
Evelyn spun and fell.
“Mother!”
Tristan reached her first.
Blood spread across her shoulder.
“Through and through,” he said.
Another burst hit the doorway.
Rafe grabbed Holly’s arm.
She struck him.
“Listen to me!”
He dragged her behind the stone wall as bullets punched into the opposite side.
“Rossi came for the card.”
“Let go.”
“He will kill everyone here.”
“Unlike you?”
Rafe flinched.
Good.
Weston reached them.
“Release her.”
Rafe did.
Outside, Midnight screamed.
Then Mary screamed.
Weston’s face emptied.
He ran.
Holly followed.
The yard had become chaos.
2 vehicles had crashed through the fence.
Rossi’s men fired from behind them.
Hargrove guards returned fire.
Tristan’s men were dragging Evelyn toward cover.
And Mary stood beside Midnight near the tree line.
A masked man had 1 arm around her.
Gun against her head.
Weston stopped.
Every weapon on the Hargrove side lowered.
The masked man shouted.
“Card!”
Rossi stepped from behind the SUV.
His tuxedo jacket was gone.
Blood marked his cheek.
“Give me the card, Weston.”
Weston held up the microSD.
Holly had not realized he carried it.
Rossi smiled.
“Good.”
“Release Mary.”
“Card first.”
“No.”
Rossi sighed.
“We have done business for too many years to pretend trust matters.”
“We have never done business.”
“Your family has.”
“I am not my family.”
Rossi laughed.
“That is the lie every Hargrove tells before becoming one.”
Mary was crying now.
Midnight stood rigid beside her.
The masked man kept his gun near her temple.
Holly looked at the stallion.
His ears.
His breathing.
His eyes.
He was not looking at the gunman.
He was looking at Mary.
Holly whispered, “Midnight.”
Weston looked at her.
She did not look away from the horse.
“Trust him.”
Then she stepped forward.
Rossi raised his gun.
“Stay there.”
Holly continued.
“Holly,” Weston warned.
She ignored him.
“Mary.”
The child looked at her.
“Remember the field.”
Mary’s crying slowed.
Rossi frowned.
“What?”
Holly looked at Midnight.
Someone patient came along.
Someone who sat in the field until the horse understood he wasn’t alone.
“Now, mouse.”
Mary dropped.
Midnight moved.
The stallion struck sideways with terrifying speed.
His shoulder hit the masked man.
The gun fired into the air.
Mary rolled beneath the fence.
Weston ran.
Gunfire erupted.
Holly hit the ground.
Tristan fired from behind the carriage house.
Rafe pulled Evelyn into cover.
Rossi’s men scattered.
Midnight chased 1 gunman away from Mary.
Weston reached his daughter and covered her with his body.
Holly crawled toward them.
Then she saw Rossi.
He was not running.
He was watching Midnight.
And smiling.
In his hand was a remote.
Holly saw the red button.
“Weston!”
Rossi pressed it.
Nothing happened.
His smile vanished.
Tristan laughed from across the yard.
“Looking for this?”
He held up a small receiver.
Rossi stared.
Tristan shrugged.
“I have trust issues.”
Weston raised his weapon.
Rossi backed toward the SUV.
“You shoot me, the network survives.”
Weston’s eyes were ice.
“Then we kill the network next.”
Rossi escaped through the trees under covering fire.
But for the first time, he ran.
And for the first time, Rafe Hargrove stayed behind.
May you like
Not because anyone trusted him.
Because Evelyn was bleeding in his arms.
