Chapter 11 - THE ABDUCTION
Nathan and Grace reached the federal field office without incident.
They spent two hours identifying Whitmore properties along the lake.
Seven docks.
Three warehouses.
Two marina facilities.
One private shipping terminal.
Agents began surveillance.
At nine fifteen, Nathan and Grace left through a secured underground garage.
Their protection vehicle waited twenty feet away.
Grace stopped.
Her eyes narrowed.
Nathan noticed.
“What?”
“The driver.”
Nathan looked.
A man in a dark suit stood beside the SUV.
Grace whispered.
“That isn’t the same agent.”
Nathan immediately pulled her backward.
The false driver reached inside his jacket.
Security shouted.
The garage erupted.
Nathan pushed Grace behind a concrete pillar.
A second man appeared from between parked cars.
Then a third.
Smoke exploded across the garage.
Nathan lost sight of the security team.
Grace coughed.
“Nathan!”
He grabbed her hand.
“Stay with me.”
Someone struck Nathan from behind.
Pain exploded through his skull.
He fell to one knee.
Grace screamed.
Nathan tried to stand.
A man kicked him in the ribs.
Another grabbed Grace.
She fought violently.
“Let go of me!”
Nathan lunged.
Martin Vale stepped through the smoke.
He hit Nathan across the face with a metal flashlight.
Nathan collapsed.
His vision blurred.
Martin looked down at him.
“You should have stayed in your office.”
Nathan tried to reach Grace.
Martin smiled.
“Don’t worry.”
“Charles only needs her for an hour.”
Grace kicked the man holding her.
She almost escaped.
Martin grabbed her hair and pulled her backward.
Nathan forced himself upright.
Martin pointed a handgun.
“Move again.”
Nathan froze.
Grace stopped fighting.
Martin leaned close to her.
“Good girl.”
Grace looked directly into his face.
Then spit at him.
Martin’s expression twisted.
Nathan almost smiled despite the gun.
“That’s Grace.”
Martin struck her.
Nathan surged forward.
A gunshot echoed.
Nathan dropped.
Grace screamed.
The bullet had struck the concrete inches from him.
Federal agents poured into the garage from the opposite entrance.
Martin dragged Grace toward a service van.
The doors slammed.
The van accelerated through an emergency exit.
Nathan tried to follow.
An agent held him back.
“We have the plate.”
“It’s stolen.”
“We have cameras.”
“They’ll switch vehicles.”
Nathan knew men like Charles.
They had planned every layer.
Nathan grabbed the agent.
“Track her phone.”
“She doesn’t have it.”
Nathan froze.
Grace’s phone lay on the garage floor.
Then Nathan remembered something.
Her necklace.
Three months earlier, Cole security had issued all household staff emergency panic pendants after a burglary in the neighborhood.
Grace still wore hers.
Nathan pointed.
“The pendant.”
The agent contacted the technical team.
The signal appeared.
Moving east.
Toward the lake.
Nathan stared at the map.
“Whitmore Terminal Seven.”
Agents mobilized.
Nathan insisted on going.
The lead agent refused.
Nathan ignored him.
They compromised by placing Nathan in the command vehicle.
Grace’s signal stopped at Terminal Seven.
Then disappeared.
Nathan stared at the screen.
“Why?”
A technician answered.
“Signal blocked.”
Nathan looked toward the vast shipping facility ahead.
Metal warehouses.
Cargo containers.
Loading cranes.
Water beyond.
Somewhere inside, Grace was with the men who had terrorized her family for five years.
Nathan’s hands began shaking.
He looked down.
For once, he did not hide it.
The lead agent said.
“We will get her.”
Nathan stared through the windshield.
“You better.”
Inside Terminal Seven, Grace sat tied to a chair.
Charles Whitmore stood in front of her.
He wore a charcoal suit.
Perfectly pressed.
Not a hair out of place.
He looked exactly like the respected billionaire photographed beside mayors and hospital donors.
Grace stared at him.
“You got old.”
Charles smiled.
“And you became rude.”
“You murdered my father.”
Charles’s smile faded.
“That remains legally unproven.”
“Not for long.”
Charles walked closer.
“You always believed evidence was the same thing as power.”
“It is not.”
Grace looked around.
Martin stood near the door.
Two other men guarded the warehouse.
“What do you want?”
Charles pulled a chair closer.
He sat.
“The location of Robert’s original recordings.”
“Federal agents have them.”
“No.”
Charles shook his head.
“Robert was more paranoid than that.”
“He kept a master copy.”
Grace said nothing.
Charles watched her.
“Michael knew where.”
Grace’s heart accelerated.
She thought of the question.
What did Michael save first?
The bird.
The key.
The basement.
But they had found evidence there.
Maybe not everything.
Charles leaned forward.
“Your father left something to you.”
Grace smiled faintly.
“Yes.”
Charles’s eyes sharpened.
Grace continued.
“He left me the ability to recognize a frightened old man.”
Martin stepped toward her.
Charles raised one hand.
Grace looked him directly in the eye.
“You are losing.”
Charles stood.
“No.”
He straightened his cuffs.
“I am adapting.”
A phone rang.
Martin answered.
His face changed.
He looked at Charles.
“They’re outside.”
Charles smiled.
“Excellent.”
Grace stared at him.
“You wanted them here.”
Charles turned toward the warehouse doors.
“I wanted Nathan here.”
Grace’s blood went cold.
“This isn’t an escape.”
Charles looked back.
“No.”
“It’s an acquisition.”
Outside, Nathan watched agents surround the terminal.
Then every light inside the warehouse turned on at once.
A giant screen mounted above the loading bay flickered to life.
Charles Whitmore appeared.
Grace sat tied behind him.
Nathan stepped toward the screen.
Charles smiled.
“Hello, Nathan.”
Nathan’s face became stone.
Charles continued.
“You have something that belongs to me.”
Nathan whispered.
“No.”
Charles looked directly into the camera.
“You have my company.”
May you like
“And I intend to take it back.”
*
