Chapter 13 - THE LAST FLIGHT
Nathan disappeared from the hospital before agents could arrest him.
A doctor had found an empty handcuff attached to his bed and a bribed guard unconscious in the supply room.
We raced to the Mercer airfield.
The company jet waited on the runway with its engines running.
Captain Shaw’s SUV was parked near the hangar.
Lena’s team surrounded the aircraft.
“Shut down the engines!” she ordered through a loudspeaker.
The cabin door opened.
Nathan appeared with a gun pressed against Owen’s daughter, Emily.
She was sixteen, thin, and terrified.
“Let the plane leave,” Nathan shouted, “or she dies.”
Owen had risked everything to protect his child.
Now Nathan was using her as a shield.
I stepped out from behind an armored vehicle.
“Where’s Juliette?”
Nathan smiled. “Still worried about your sister?”
“She has the password you need.”
“I already have it.”
He held up the metal strip from Mom’s necklace.
Juliette had given it to him—or he had taken it.
“Why marry her?” I asked.
“To get close to the Mercer accounts.”
“So all of this was about money?”
“It’s always about money.”
“No,” I said. “Money is just what people like you blame when you don’t want to admit you enjoy hurting others.”
His smile disappeared.
A gunshot sounded inside the plane.
Nathan looked back.
Emily bit his hand and broke free.
Lena’s agents opened fire.
Nathan ran into the cabin.
I followed before Lena could stop me.
Inside, Captain Shaw lay dead in the aisle.
Juliette sat near the cockpit, bleeding from her side. She had shot him.
Nathan grabbed her by the hair.
“Where’s the hard drive?”
She laughed weakly.
“You thought I’d let you leave with everything?”
He struck her.
I aimed Lena’s spare gun at him.
“Let her go.”
Nathan pulled Juliette in front of him.
“You really are stupid, Caroline. She burned you alive.”
“And you think that gives you permission to finish the job?”
Juliette looked at me.
For one second, we were children again—two sisters hiding beneath a dining table while a thunderstorm shook the windows.
Then she drove her elbow into Nathan’s ribs.
I fired.
The bullet hit his leg.
Nathan fell against the emergency exit and accidentally released the handle.
The door tore open.
Wind ripped through the cabin.
Nathan slid across the floor toward the opening. He caught the edge with both hands.
“Help me!” he screamed.
I crawled toward him.
Juliette grabbed my arm.
“Let him fall.”
I looked at my sister.
“That’s what you would do.”
I reached for Nathan.
He smiled and pulled a knife from his sleeve.
Before he could stab me, Juliette kicked his hand loose.
Nathan vanished through the open door.
The plane had not left the ground, but it was moving fast.
He struck the runway and rolled beneath the wing.
The pilot stopped the aircraft.
Agents flooded the cabin.
Nathan was alive, barely.
Juliette collapsed against her seat.
I pressed my hands over her wound.
“Why are you helping me?” she asked.
“Because I’m not you.”
Tears slipped from her eyes.
“The hard drive is in Dad’s house,” she whispered. “Behind Mom’s portrait.”
Then she gripped my wrist.
“But if you think Nathan was the last person involved, you still don’t understand.”
“Who else?”
May you like
Juliette looked toward the cockpit.
“Our father started everything.”
