Chapter 9
Police traced Evan’s call to three different towers.
He was moving.
The Carter house was probably a trap.
Rebecca insisted on helping.
“This began because I ran,” she said through the video connection.
“You survived,” I replied. “That isn’t the same as running.”
“He wants me.”
“He wants control. Giving him another victim won’t save Lily.”
Detective Torres studied traffic cameras near the station.
One showed Evan’s car leaving the area.
Lily was in the passenger seat.
She appeared conscious.
Ten minutes later, the car entered an underground garage downtown.
It never came out.
Torres recognized the building.
It belonged to Holloway’s law firm.
Police surrounded it.
The offices were empty, but the elevator camera showed Evan and Lily descending to the basement.
The basement connected to old service tunnels beneath the block.
Evan could emerge through six different buildings.
Then my phone received a text from Lily’s number.
A photograph showed her sitting on the floor beside a metal door.
Her hands were tied.
Behind her was a yellow pipe marked W-17.
Dad recognized it from one of his old construction projects.
“The west utility tunnel.”
He gave Torres the original plans.
W-17 ran beneath an abandoned bank.
Police divided into teams.
I was ordered to stay behind again.
I refused.
Torres looked at me.
“If you enter that tunnel, you could get Lily killed.”
“If Evan sees only police, he may panic. He asked for Rebecca, but he’ll talk to me.”
She finally allowed me to approach the entrance wearing a protective vest.
Officers remained close behind.
The tunnel smelled of rust and wet concrete.
“Evan!” I shouted. “I came alone.”
His laughter echoed through the darkness.
“You never do what you’re told.”
“Let Lily go.”
“Bring Rebecca.”
“She isn’t coming.”
A light appeared ahead.
Evan stood behind Lily with a knife near her shoulder.
The black bird tattoo covered his wrist.
Lily’s face was streaked with tears, but she held her head high.
“Mom, he wants the account password.”
The overseas bank required a second phrase before releasing the money.
The paper in the music box had contained only the first.
Evan believed Rebecca knew the rest.
“I don’t have it,” I said.
“Diane says your father does.”
Dad had followed us into the tunnel despite Torres’s orders.
He stepped from behind the officers.
“I know the phrase.”
Evan pulled Lily closer.
“Tell me.”
“Release her first.”
“You think I’m stupid?”
“I think Diane lied to you. She’s planning to blame you for everything.”
Evan’s expression changed.
Dad continued.
“She already prepared forged documents carrying your signature.”
“That’s not true.”
“Ryan said the same thing.”
“Ryan betrayed the family.”
“Diane betrays everyone.”
Evan pressed the knife closer to Lily.
I saw my daughter watching his hand.
She was waiting.
I remembered what she had done when she found Diane choking me.
Lily did not panic.
She thought.
She acted.
Dad said the supposed password slowly.
“Rebecca came home.”
Evan blinked.
“That’s it?”
“No,” Dad answered. “That was the message Victor used to identify the account.”
Evan looked confused.
Lily drove her heel into his foot.
Then she dropped her weight.
The knife moved away from her shoulder.
I ran.
Evan grabbed my jacket, but I struck his wrist.
Lily crawled toward the officers.
Evan pulled a gun from his waistband.
Dad stepped between us.
A shot exploded through the tunnel.
Dad fell.
Police tackled Evan before he could fire again.
I dropped beside my father.
Blood spread across his shirt.
“Dad!”
His eyes opened.
“Lily?”
“She’s safe.”
He tried to smile.
Paramedics rushed him to surgery.
The bullet had missed his heart but damaged his lung.
Doctors could not promise he would survive the night.
Lily sat beside me in the hospital, still wrapped in a police blanket.
“I made him angry,” she whispered. “Grandpa got shot because I kicked him.”
“No. Evan shot Grandpa because Evan chose to hurt him.”
“But if I had waited—”
“You did exactly what you had to do.”
At three in the morning, the surgeon entered.
Dad had survived.
He would need months to recover, but he was alive.
Lily and I held each other and cried.
Evan was charged with kidnapping, attempted murder, and conspiracy.
His arrest finally broke Diane.
When prosecutors told her Evan had failed, she demanded a deal.
She offered the second banking phrase in exchange for contact with Rebecca.
Rebecca refused.
The bank did not need the phrase anymore.
Federal investigators had obtained a court order to seize the account.
Diane had nothing left to trade.
Three weeks later, Ryan asked to see Lily.
The court allowed Lily to decide.
She wrote him a letter instead.
I was there when she placed it in the envelope.
“What did you tell him?” I asked.
“The truth.”
Ryan read it in jail.
Later, Maya obtained a copy for the custody case.
It contained only five lines.
Dad,
I loved you.
I needed you.
May you like
You watched them hurt Mom.
Grandpa didn’t watch.
