Chapter 3 - The Millionaire at Apartment 4B
Daniel opened the basement door.
The hallway was empty.
On the floor sat a small envelope.
Inside was a key.
Emily recognized it.
“My mother wore this around her neck.”
Daniel examined the brass key.
A number was stamped into it.
They spent the afternoon trying to determine what it opened.
At four, Emily had to work.
Daniel told her not to go.
She laughed.
“Are you paying my rent now?”
“I could.”
“That wasn't an invitation.”
“I meant you may be in danger.”
“And missing a shift makes me unemployed in danger.”
Daniel had never met anyone quite like her.
She was frightened.
He could see it.
But fear didn't stop her.
It simply traveled with her.
He drove her to the restaurant.
“I have a bus pass.”
“Humor me.”
“You're not very funny.”
For the first time since the previous night, Daniel laughed.
Emily looked at him.
It changed his face.
For a moment he wasn't Daniel Mercer, millionaire developer.
He was simply the embarrassed stranger whose card she had paid.
“You should do that more often,” she said.
“What?”
“Look human.”
“That's devastating.”
“You'll recover.”
Inside the restaurant, Emily returned to work.
Daniel sat at the bar with his laptop.
He searched old Mercer files.
Property 314 led nowhere.
Account 314 had been closed.
Office 314 belonged to a dentist.
Then he searched his father's archived calendar.
A meeting appeared twenty-eight years earlier.
314 WILLOW — E. CARTER.
Emily's mother.
Daniel called an investigator.
Willow Street had once housed a community bank.
The building had been demolished twenty years ago.
But its safe-deposit boxes had been transferred.
Box 314 still existed.
At First Metropolitan Bank.
Registered jointly to Laura Carter and Charles Mercer.
Daniel stared at the screen.
At closing time, he showed Emily.
She looked at the key.
“Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow,” Daniel agreed.
Across the restaurant, a man lowered his newspaper and walked out.
Neither noticed him.
The next morning they entered First Metropolitan.
The bank manager verified Emily's identity.
Then Daniel's.
His eyebrows rose when he saw the registration.
“Interesting.”
“What?” Daniel asked.
“This box has had an access alert for years.”
“Who placed it?”
The manager checked.
“Victor Hale.”
Daniel's stomach tightened.
Marcus's father.
“He had no ownership.”
“No. But according to the record, Mr. Hale attempted to access it repeatedly.”
“When?”
The manager turned the screen.
The most recent attempt was three weeks ago.
Victor Hale had died nine years earlier.
Emily whispered, “Another dead man.”
The manager led them downstairs.
Box 314 contained one envelope.
Nothing else.
Emily opened it.
Inside was a handwritten letter from her mother.
Emily,
If you're reading this, someone has started asking questions again.
Charles Mercer tried to help me expose what happened. He was not my lover, and Daniel is not your brother, no matter what anyone tells you. That lie was created to frighten us apart.
Daniel blinked.
Emily glanced at him.
“Well, that's one mystery I wasn't expecting.”
Despite the tension, he almost smiled.
She continued.
The building was never supposed to belong to Mercer Properties. It belonged to the families who paid into the Willow Housing Trust. Victor Hale changed the records. Charles discovered it and intended to return everything.
He died before he could.
Daniel stopped breathing.
His father's death had been ruled a heart attack.
The letter continued.
The proof is in the original ledger.
I hid it where Victor would never look.
If Daniel has become the man Charles hoped he would become, trust him.
Emily's eyes filled.
She hadn't heard her mother's voice in four years.
Yet every line sounded like her.
At the bottom:
The ledger is behind the place where kindness cost us everything.
Daniel read the sentence twice.
“What does that mean?”
Emily knew.
“My mother worked at the restaurant.”
“The same restaurant?”
“For eleven years.”
Daniel stared.
“Where?”
“She always talked about a private dining room that used to be downstairs.”
The restaurant had been renovated.
But Daniel found old architectural plans.
A service corridor still existed behind the wine cellar.
That night, after closing, the owner allowed them inside.
Emily found a bricked-over doorway.
Daniel noticed one brick was newer.
They removed it.
Behind it was a narrow cavity.
Emily reached inside.
Her fingers touched leather.
She pulled out an old ledger.
Daniel opened it.
Pages of names.
Payments.
Properties.
Trust accounts.
And transfers.
Millions had been diverted.
At the bottom of several pages was Victor Hale's signature.
But the final page contained another signature.
Charles Mercer.
Emily stared.
“Your father signed it too.”
Daniel felt sick.
Maybe his father hadn't been trying to expose Victor.
Maybe he had been part of it.
Then Emily turned the page.
A note was written in Charles's handwriting.
VICTOR FORGED MY NAME. ORIGINALS SENT TO—
The sentence ended where half the page had been cut away.
A noise sounded behind them.
Daniel turned.
The wine-cellar door slammed shut.
The lock clicked.
Emily rushed toward it.
“Hello?”
No answer.
Then smoke began curling beneath the door.
Daniel grabbed her hand.
“Back.”
The smoke thickened.
Someone had locked them underground.
Emily looked toward the narrow service corridor.
At its end was another door.
May you like
She reached for the handle.
It was already moving from the other side.
