Chapter 4 - Box 417
Union Continental Bank locked down the private vault at 12:18 a.m.
By the time Claire arrived, Robert was gone.
Box 417 was open.
Empty.
Except for one object.
A dance medal.
Claire's first national championship medal.
She picked it up.
Something had been scratched into the back.
A date.
October 14.
Twelve years earlier.
The day before her crash.
Beneath it were two initials.
R.A.
Richard Ashford stared at them.
“That isn't me.”
Claire turned.
“Convenient.”
“I didn't know your father.”
“Apparently everyone knew my family except me.”
Adrian stepped between them.
“Claire.”
She looked at him.
“Don't.”
He stopped.
She didn't want his sympathy.
Worse, she didn't want to acknowledge how safe she had begun feeling when he stood near her.
Trust had become dangerous.
Mercer reviewed security footage.
Robert entered alone.
He used Richard's executive override.
No one knew how he obtained it.
Richard called his bank chairman.
Adrian called corporate security.
Victoria sat silently.
Claire watched her.
“What are you hiding?”
Victoria looked exhausted.
“Enough to hate myself.”
“Try me.”
Victoria admitted she had met Robert the night before the crash.
October 14.
She had been frightened.
Gerald had demanded she lose the London championship deliberately.
Robert convinced her to testify.
The initials R.A. did not mean Richard Ashford.
They meant Robert's contact.
Rebecca Allen.
An assistant U.S. attorney.
Mercer stiffened.
“I know that name.”
Rebecca Allen disappeared eleven years ago.
Never found.
Claire stared at the medal.
“Was she killed?”
“Nobody knows.”
Adrian was searching his phone.
“Wait.”
He turned the screen around.
Rebecca Allen had a daughter.
Sophie.
Claire recognized the face.
Mrs. Keller.
Her catering supervisor.
The woman who had hired Claire six months earlier.
The woman who had arranged for Claire to work the Ashford gala.
Claire’s blood ran cold.
“This wasn't coincidence.”
Mercer shook his head.
“No.”
Claire called Mrs. Keller.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
A text arrived.
FROM MRS. KELLER:
I’m sorry, Claire. Your father made me promise.
An address followed.
Lakeview Dance Center.
4:00 a.m.
COME ALONE.
Claire showed Mercer.
He immediately said, “Absolutely not.”
Adrian agreed.
Claire looked at both men.
“Do either of you understand what ‘alone’ means?”
“No,” Adrian said. “Apparently not.”
Despite herself, Claire smiled.
It vanished quickly.
At 3:56 a.m., Claire entered Lakeview Dance Center.
Mercer waited nearby.
Adrian refused to leave and waited across the street.
Mrs. Keller stood alone inside.
Except she wasn't Mrs. Keller.
“Sophie Allen?” Claire asked.
The woman nodded.
“My mother died because she tried to expose Gerald Ashford.”
“You know that?”
“I know enough.”
“Why hire me?”
“Your father asked me to keep you close.”
“Where is he?”
Sophie looked toward a curtain.
Robert stepped out.
Claire forgot every speech she had rehearsed.
He was thinner.
Older.
But he was her father.
She crossed the room and slapped him.
The sound echoed.
Robert accepted it.
Then Claire hit his chest with both hands.
“You were alive.”
“I know.”
“I buried you.”
“I know.”
“I needed you.”
His eyes filled.
“I know.”
She hated those words.
Then she hugged him.
Hard.
For several seconds she was twenty-one again.
Broken.
Terrified.
Wanting her father.
Then she pushed away.
“You don't get forgiveness because you're alive.”
“I don't expect it.”
“Good.”
Robert placed a thick black ledger on the table.
“This is what they want.”
Inside were names.
Judges.
Executives.
Politicians.
Account numbers.
Payments.
Years of corruption.
Claire turned pages.
Then stopped.
Richard Ashford.
His name appeared repeatedly.
Robert said, “Keep reading.”
The payments connected to Richard were marked REJECTED.
Gerald had attempted to involve his brother.
Richard refused.
Claire looked up.
“So Richard wasn't part of it?”
“Not originally.”
“Originally?”
Robert's expression changed.
“After Gerald died, someone took over.”
“Who?”
Robert opened the ledger to the final page.
A recent payment.
Two million dollars.
Authorized through an Ashford subsidiary.
The signature belonged to Adrian Ashford.
Claire stared at it.
“No.”
“I’m sorry.”
“He wouldn't.”
“You've known him one night.”
Claire remembered Adrian defending her.
Catching her.
Driving her.
Standing beside her.
Maybe that had been the point.
Her phone rang.
Adrian.
Robert said, “Don't answer.”
Claire did.
“Where are you?”
Adrian sounded frantic.
“Across the street. Someone just tried to break into Mercer's car.”
Claire looked through the window.
Adrian stood beneath a streetlamp holding his phone.
Then a black SUV pulled beside him.
Two men got out.
“Adrian!”
He turned.
One man struck him.
Claire ran.
Robert grabbed her.
“No.”
Adrian fought.
The second man forced him into the SUV.
It sped away.
Claire screamed.
Her phone buzzed.
A message from Adrian’s number.
BRING THE LEDGER TO ASHFORD TOWER AT SUNRISE.
COME WITH ROBERT.
OR ADRIAN DIES.
Claire looked at her father.
Robert closed the ledger.
“No.”
Claire grabbed it from him.
“Yes.”
“Claire, that's what they want.”
She looked through the window where Adrian had disappeared.
“Then for once, Dad, we're going to stop hiding.”
Another message arrived.
This one contained a photograph of Adrian tied to a chair.
Behind him stood a person whose face was hidden.
But one hand rested on Adrian's shoulder.
May you like
On that hand was a wedding ring Claire recognized.
Victoria Ashford’s.
