Chapter 5 - Forty Seconds
Thursday morning Graham wore a charcoal suit Natalie had never seen.
“You hate that suit,” she said.
“My mother likes it.”
“That doesn’t answer me.”
“I wore it the day we got married.”
Natalie looked at him.
He adjusted his cuff.
“You believe in omens now?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
He looked at her reflection in the mirror.
“Because I made promises in this suit I haven’t been very good at keeping.”
Her expression softened.
Graham crossed the room.
He touched the edge of her eyebrow carefully.
“No sunglasses?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I’m still not going to the meeting.”
“No.”
“Because it’s dangerous?”
“Yes.”
“Or because you’re protecting what you love where nobody can see it?”
His face tightened.
She let him sit with that.
Finally Graham said, “Both.”
“Better answer.”
He kissed her forehead.
Not the air beside her hair.
Not her temple as he often did in public.
Her forehead.
Then he left.
Natalie watched the convoy pull away.
Three Harbor Shield vehicles.
Three Harbor Shield drivers.
Brent Halley in the second SUV.
The agreement was being signed at Cedar House, a private restaurant near downtown Greyhaven.
Phones would be collected at the door.
Twelve men inside.
Graham.
Malcolm Reddick.
Two attorneys from each side.
Senior representatives.
Brent.
Caleb.
And several witnesses trusted by both groups.
At 11:36 a.m., Natalie tried Graham.
Straight to voicemail.
Expected.
At 11:38 she tried Caleb.
Nothing.
Expected.
At 11:41, the old kitchen phone rang.
One of the house staff answered.
Then looked at Natalie.
“Mrs. Vance? Someone says they’re calling from Cedar House.”
Natalie took it.
No voice.
Only breathing.
Then the line disconnected.
She stared at the receiver.
A warning?
A mistake?
Or proof someone knew she was still in the house?
She looked through the window.
One of the unfamiliar Harbor Shield men was watching the kitchen.
Natalie’s pulse slowed.
Trauma-bay slow.
The kind of calm that arrived when panic became useless.
She took the memory card from the laptop.
Copied the footage onto two drives.
Sent another encrypted copy to the family attorney.
Then she walked into the garage.
Walter Vance’s oldest driver, Frank Nolan, looked up from a cup of coffee.
“Mrs. Vance?”
“Can you drive?”
“Anywhere.”
She tossed him the passenger-side keys.
“Actually, no. I’m driving.”
Ten minutes later, the Honda stopped behind Cedar House.
Natalie entered through the service door.
She had spent a decade walking into rooms where people believed the worst thing had already happened.
This room felt exactly the same.
She heard Brent before she saw him.
“Before anyone signs, Malcolm deserves to know what Graham has hidden.”
Natalie stopped behind the swinging door.
Paper slid across a table.
Brent continued.
“His wife was injured September twenty-ninth. Hospital records. Retinal damage. Laceration. You expect him to sign peace after your people did that to her?”
A chair scraped.
Someone swore.
Another voice said, “We did not touch his wife.”
Brent answered calmly.
“Then why hide it?”
Natalie closed her eyes.
There it was.
The trap.
“If a man conceals blood before an agreement,” Brent said, “it’s because he plans to collect the debt after everybody lowers their guard.”
Natalie pushed the door open.
“Or because his wife understands triage.”
Every head turned.
Graham rose halfway from his chair.
“Natalie.”
She walked into the room.
Brent went pale.
Natalie placed her phone on the table.
“I need forty seconds.”
Malcolm Reddick was sixty, silver-haired, broad, and looked more like the owner of a construction company than a man half the state feared.
He studied her injured eye.
Then looked at Graham.
May you like
Graham sat back down.
“Give her forty seconds.”
