Chapter 10 - THE FIRE
Black smoke rose over the South Side.
By the time we arrived, firefighters had surrounded the diner.
Flames poured through the kitchen windows.
The neon sign flickered once.
Then fell.
I stood across the street while twenty:three years of my life burned.
My husband’s photograph.
Hannah’s childhood drawings.
The height marks on the kitchen doorway.
The booth where David had proposed to me.
Gone.
Hannah held my hand.
“I’m sorry.”
“You didn’t do this.”
“Grant did.”
We did not have proof.
Not yet.
A firefighter approached.
“Mrs. Carter?”
“Yes.”
“We found evidence of an accelerant near the rear entrance.”
Daniel looked at me.
“Grant used the service tunnel.”
The tunnel had saved us.
Now it had helped him destroy the diner.
My phone rang.
Grant.
I answered.
He sounded breathless but pleased.
“You should’ve brought her back.”
“You burned a building full of memories.”
“I warned you.”
“Where are you?”
“You have sixty hours left.”
“Your company is gone. Your board abandoned you. Federal agents are looking for you.”
“I still have Hannah.”
My heart stopped.
I turned.
Hannah was no longer beside me.
Her coat lay on the pavement.
Daniel ran toward the alley.
A black sedan sped away from the far end.
I heard Hannah’s muffled scream through the phone.
Grant spoke softly.
“Now we negotiate.”
The call ended.
I stood in front of the burning diner, surrounded by police officers, firefighters, reporters, and strangers.
But all I could hear was my daughter’s voice.
Catherine arrived minutes later.
“We’ll find her.”
“No,” I said.
Everyone looked at me.
“Grant wants me to follow.”
Daniel understood first.
“He’ll take her somewhere connected to the old case.”
I looked at the flames.
David had left more than files.
He had left a map hidden inside the photograph in my safe.
A map of the warehouse where Richard Holloway once stored falsified food shipments.
The same warehouse where David had found the evidence that nearly destroyed him.
Grant was not running.
He was trying to finish what his father had started.
May you like
And this time, he planned to make sure no Carter survived.
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