Chapter 9 - The Unraveling
Mark Vance was sitting in the living room of his father’s sprawling estate, his arm still bound in the sling, when the news broke.
His father’s construction sites were abruptly shut down by federal marshals executing search warrants. The company bank accounts were frozen. The subcontractors, realizing they weren't going to get paid, began pulling their equipment off the jobs.
Richard Vance, red-faced and hyperventilating, stood over his son, screaming until veins bulged in his neck.
“You idiot!” Richard roared, throwing a crystal tumbler against the stone fireplace. “You stole from the banks under your own roof? You dragged federal agents into my company? Everything I built for thirty years is gone because you couldn't keep your hands to yourself!”
Mark sat on the leather sofa, trembling. The painkillers and the sudden collapse of his protected reality had left him manic, paranoid, and completely unmoored.
“It’s the old man,” Mark muttered, his eyes wide and bloodshot. “It’s Miller. He did this. If I take Emily back, he has no case. It’s Emily’s testimony! Without her, the domestic charges fall apart!”
“Emily isn't coming back, you moron!” Richard shouted. “She’s hidden! Sterling said Miller has her locked down tight!”
Mark didn't answer. He waited until his father stormed out of the room to take a call from his criminal defense team.
Then, Mark stood up.
He didn't have his phone—the police had seized it. But he had a spare burner he kept in his desk drawer, and he had something else: an old GPS tracker he had installed on the undercarriage of my sedan two years ago, back when he had first started dating Emily and wanted to know if I ever visited her unannounced.
He pulled up the tracking software on an old tablet.
May you like
The red dot wasn't in the city. It was two hours north, stationary at a remote lake property.
Mark’s face twisted into a grotesque, manic grin. He grabbed his car keys, slipped a hunting knife from the gun safe into his coat pocket, and slipped out through the service garage before his father’s security team could notice.
