Chapter 4 - The Brother I Buried
Julian Cross had been dead for five years.
At least that was what I had believed.
I had stood beside his coffin.
I had watched it lowered into the ground.
I had carried the guilt of his death longer than Ruby had been alive.
Now his face stared at me from a photograph dated two years after his funeral.
Dominic enlarged the image.
No mistake.
Same crooked smile.
Same scar through the left eyebrow.
Same leather watch I had bought him when he turned twenty-five.
Warren had lied to me.
Elena had hidden things from me.
But a dead brother walking beside my wife?
That was different.
“Check the metadata.”
Dominic did.
“Original file.”
“Date?”
“Three years and four months ago.”
One month before Elena became sick.
I stared at the image.
“Find Julian.”
Dominic looked at me.
“If he’s alive.”
“He’s alive.”
“How can you know?”
“Because dead men don’t pose for photographs.”
We searched the veterinary hospital.
In the basement, we found records.
Names.
Dates.
Payments.
Hundreds of children.
Some had been recovered.
Many had not.
Theo’s friends were among them.
I called people I trusted outside my normal network.
Federal contacts.
A judge Elena once respected.
A journalist who owed me nothing and feared me even less.
For the first time in my life, I prepared to destroy something without controlling what happened afterward.
Elena had been right.
If I handled this like a war between criminals, evidence would disappear.
People would die.
Children would remain hidden.
So I did something I hated.
I asked for help.
Then Theo found a drawing.
Ruby’s paper star.
Inside it she had written:
UNCLE J.
My heart stopped.
Ruby knew Julian?
Impossible.
She had been a baby when he supposedly died.
Theo looked at me.
“Who’s Uncle J?”
“My brother.”
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
Caleb pointed toward an old photograph pinned to the wall.
“That man.”
Julian.
“You saw him?”
Caleb nodded.
“At the tunnel.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Did he hurt Ruby?”
Caleb shook his head.
“He told her to run.”
That changed everything again.
Maybe Julian was not working with Thomas.
Maybe he had infiltrated them.
Maybe he had been trying to protect Ruby.
Or maybe he was manipulating a four-year-old witness.
We returned to the mansion.
Warren remained under guard.
I brought the photograph to him.
His face told me the truth before he spoke.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
My hand tightened around the photograph.
“You let me bury an empty coffin.”
“It wasn’t empty.”
“What?”
“There was a body.”
“Whose?”
“A man Julian killed.”
The words hit like a physical blow.
“Why fake his death?”
“Because Thomas had ordered yours.”
I stared at him.
“Explain.”
“Five years ago Julian discovered the network while moving money through Aegis. He came to Elena. They decided the only way to expose it was from inside.”
“So he died.”
“Publicly.”
“And Elena knew.”
“Yes.”
“She let me grieve him.”
“She was protecting you.”
I laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
“Everybody seems to have protected me by lying.”
Warren looked down.
“Julian stayed inside the network.”
“And now?”
“I don’t know.”
I held up Ruby’s star.
“She wrote Uncle J.”
Warren’s eyes changed.
“She’s seen him.”
“Apparently.”
“Then he reached her before Thomas moved her.”
“Is that good?”
“I don’t know.”
That answer was becoming unbearable.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
“Sebastian.”
My brother’s voice.
Older.
Rougher.
Alive.
“Julian.”
Silence.
Five years collapsed into one word.
“You shouldn’t have come to the veterinary hospital.”
“You shouldn’t have attended your own funeral.”
“I didn’t have a choice.”
“You always had choices.”
“Not this time.”
“Where is Ruby?”
“Alive.”
“Put her on.”
“I can’t.”
“Then tell me where.”
“They’re moving her.”
“Who?”
“Thomas.”
“Why?”
“Because Elena left something with you.”
“What?”
“Not evidence.”
“Then what?”
Julian breathed out.
“A name.”
“What name?”
“The person financing everything.”
“Who?”
“I can’t tell you over the phone.”
I nearly crushed the device.
“You’ve had five years to learn how little patience I have.”
“I remember.”
“Then talk.”
“I need you alone.”
“Absolutely not.”
“If you bring your men, Ruby dies.”
“Where?”
“The old Cross textile mill.”
I knew it.
Our father had owned it.
Closed twenty years ago.
“One hour.”
The call ended.
Dominic shook his head immediately.
“No.”
“He’s my brother.”
“He might be using that.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re going anyway.”
“Yes.”
“Then I’m following.”
“If they see you—”
“They won’t.”
I looked at him.
Dominic had been beside me for fifteen years.
He knew when arguing was pointless.
“Stay two blocks back.”
I drove alone.
The mill stood beside the river, windows broken, brick walls blackened by age.
I entered.
Julian stood beneath a hanging industrial light.
He looked thinner.
Older.
But alive.
For several seconds neither of us spoke.
Then he said, “You look terrible.”
I punched him.
He hit the floor.
I pulled him up.
Then hugged him.
Hard.
I hated him.
I loved him.
I wanted to kill him.
I wanted five lost years returned.
“You bastard.”
“I know.”
“Where is Ruby?”
“I don’t know exactly.”
I shoved him away.
“You told me to come here.”
“Because I know where she’ll be moved next.”
“Where?”
He reached into his jacket.
I raised my gun.
He froze.
“Easy.”
He removed a folded map.
A private airfield.
“Thomas plans to move the children tonight.”
“Children?”
“Ruby isn’t the only one.”
“How many?”
“Seventeen.”
I thought of Elena’s letter.
Find them all.
“What does he want from me?”
“A ledger.”
“I don’t have one.”
“Elena did.”
“Where?”
“You do have it. You just don’t know it.”
I stared.
“The bracelet.”
I pulled Ruby’s bracelet from my pocket.
Julian nodded.
“The bent star.”
I examined it.
The star charm was thicker than the others.
I twisted it.
It opened.
Inside was a tiny storage chip.
Elena had hidden evidence in Ruby’s bracelet three years earlier.
My chest tightened.
“Ruby wore this every day.”
“That was the point. Nobody would search a child.”
“What’s on it?”
“Names. Accounts. Locations.”
“And the financier?”
Julian nodded.
“Who?”
He looked at me.
“Our father.”
I stopped breathing.
“Our father died twelve years ago.”
“So we thought.”
“No.”
“I saw him.”
“So did I.”
Julian’s expression made my skin crawl.
“He died in the hospital.”
“A man died in that hospital.”
“Stop.”
“It wasn’t him.”
I turned away.
Too many dead men were becoming alive.
Julian continued.
“Father built the original version of the network decades ago. Thomas expanded it.”
“Why children?”
“Leverage. Information. Smuggling. Control.”
I felt sick.
“And Elena?”
“She discovered the truth.”
“Did Father kill her?”
“No.”
The answer came too fast.
I turned.
“Are you sure?”
“Cancer killed Elena.”
There was grief in his face.
“But Father made sure she knew Ruby would be next if she exposed him.”
My hands shook.
“So she stayed quiet.”
“She built a case.”
“And gave it to Ruby.”
“She trusted you to finish it when the time came.”
I looked toward the river through broken glass.
For years I had believed my father was ruthless but loyal to family.
Maybe everything I knew had been manufactured.
“Where is he?”
Julian hesitated.
That was enough.
“You know.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Before he could answer, a red laser dot appeared on his chest.
I tackled him.
The window exploded.
Gunfire tore through the mill.
We crawled behind machinery.
“Your men?” Julian shouted.
“No.”
“Thomas found me.”
“Or Father did.”
More shots.
Dominic’s team returned fire from outside.
Julian pointed toward a service door.
We ran.
Behind the mill, a black SUV waited.
No driver.
On the hood lay a child’s silver flat.
Ruby’s second shoe.
Beside it was a phone.
It rang.
I answered.
A familiar voice spoke.
Not distorted.
Not hidden.
“Hello, Sebastian.”
My knees nearly failed.
I had heard that voice every day of my childhood.
My father continued.
“You’ve been looking for your daughter in all the wrong places.”
May you like
Then he said an address.
My own childhood home.
