Chapter 2 - The Man Behind the Wall
For several seconds, neither man moved.
Cole looked at Damian.
Damian looked at the blood.
Then Damian raised his gun.
“Hands.”
Cole obeyed immediately.
“Boss, listen.”
“Whose blood?”
“Not mine.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
Cole glanced past Damian toward the corridor.
“Where’s the girl?”
Damian’s expression hardened.
“Wrong answer.”
“It isn’t what you think.”
Damian almost laughed.
He had learned long ago that men only used that sentence when things were exactly what they looked like.
“Turn around.”
“Damian.”
“Turn around.”
Cole did.
Damian searched him.
No weapon.
That was unusual.
Cole Mercer slept with a pistol on the nightstand and carried another in an ankle holster when he showered at the Cross estate gym.
Tonight, nothing.
“Move.”
Damian forced him into the abandoned service room behind the hidden door.
An old table occupied the center.
Dust covered most surfaces.
Except one.
A section had been recently wiped clean.
Documents rested there.
Photographs.
A burner phone.
Medical records.
Damian saw Isabella’s name on the first page.
He forgot Cole for half a second.
Half a second was enough.
Cole turned, knocked Damian’s gun sideways, and drove his shoulder into him.
They crashed into the table.
Damian struck Cole in the ribs.
Cole grunted.
Neither man reached for a weapon.
That bothered Damian more than the attack.
Cole was trying to escape, not kill him.
“Stop!”
Mara’s voice came from the passage.
Damian twisted Cole’s arm behind his back and shoved him against the wall.
Mara stood ten feet away holding Sophie.
The child was crying again.
“Don’t fight,” she whispered.
Cole closed his eyes.
“Sophie.”
The girl buried her face against Mara.
Damian looked between them.
“You know her.”
Cole said nothing.
Damian tightened his grip.
“You know her.”
“Yes.”
“Who is she?”
Cole’s shoulders dropped.
“My daughter.”
Silence filled the room.
Mara stared.
Damian released Cole only enough to turn him around.
“You have a daughter?”
“Yes.”
“You’ve worked for me fourteen years.”
“Yes.”
“You never mentioned a child.”
“She wasn’t safe.”
“From whom?”
Cole looked toward the documents.
“From the people who killed Isabella.”
Damian punched him.
Cole struck the wall and fell.
Sophie screamed.
Damian stopped instantly.
The sound hit him harder than any fist could have.
Mara knelt with the child.
“It’s okay.”
Cole wiped blood from his mouth.
“Now mine matches the shirt.”
Damian pointed at the red stains already covering him.
“Whose?”
Cole looked exhausted.
“Dr. Gerald Voss.”
Damian knew the name.
Isabella’s physician.
The man who had signed her death certificate.
“Where is he?”
“Alive.”
“For now?”
Cole nodded.
Damian crouched in front of him.
“You have thirty seconds before I forget there’s a child watching.”
Cole spoke quickly.
“Isabella didn’t trust Voss before she died. She thought someone was changing her medication. She contacted me privately.”
Damian’s expression changed.
“She contacted you?”
“Yes.”
“Behind my back?”
“She was trying to protect you.”
“From what?”
“Your family.”
Damian almost smiled.
“My family is dead.”
Cole looked at him.
“Not all of it.”
Mara stood frozen.
Damian’s father had died twelve years earlier.
His mother seventeen years earlier.
He had no siblings.
His uncle Dominic Cross was the only close relative still alive, and Dominic lived in Florida after stepping away from the organization.
Or so Damian believed.
“What did Isabella discover?”
Cole pointed toward the papers.
“She found money moving through several charities connected to Cross companies. Millions. Shell accounts. Political payments. Drugs routed through businesses you believed were clean.”
Damian picked up a photograph.
His uncle Dominic stood beside Dr. Voss.
The date stamp was six weeks before Isabella died.
Another photograph showed Isabella leaving a bank.
Another showed Cole following her.
“You followed my wife?”
“To protect her.”
“You lied to me.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“Because she made me promise.”
Damian’s hand tightened around the photograph.
Cole continued.
“Isabella believed someone close to you had spent years building a second operation beneath yours. She said if you found out too early, you’d go after them openly.”
“She knew me.”
“Exactly.”
Despite himself, Damian almost smiled.
That sounded like Isabella.
She had been the only person who could tell him the truth to his face and make him grateful for it.
“What does Sophie have to do with this?”
Cole looked toward his daughter.
“Her mother worked at the hospital.”
Mara’s eyes widened.
“Who?”
“Rachel Mercer.”
Damian remembered the name.
A nurse.
The nurse who disappeared after Isabella died.
“Rachel is your wife?”
“Was.”
“Where is she?”
Cole’s eyes lowered.
“Dead.”
Sophie did not react.
She was too young to understand.
Damian did.
“When?”
“Two months ago.”
“Who killed her?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“No. But it’s true.”
Cole explained that Rachel had helped Isabella obtain copies of medication logs before the hospital records could be altered. After Isabella died, Rachel panicked. Cole hid her and Sophie in a cottage behind one of the estate’s abandoned properties.
Rachel eventually returned to gather evidence.
She never came back.
Three weeks ago, someone brought Sophie to the Cross estate.
“Who?” Damian asked.
Cole shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s becoming your favorite answer.”
“She was asleep in the back seat of my car. There was a note.”
“Where?”
Cole pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket.
Damian opened it.
One sentence.
KEEP HER WHERE ISABELLA CAN PROTECT HER.
The handwriting looked familiar.
Damian stared at it.
Isabella’s handwriting.
Impossible.
“Forgery.”
“Maybe.”
“You had it tested?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
Cole looked toward Sophie.
“Experts said there was a strong probability it was hers.”
Damian stood.
“No.”
“I know.”
“She’s dead.”
“I watched the coffin lowered.”
“I know.”
“I saw her body.”
Cole became very still.
“Did you?”
Damian turned.
The question was absurd.
Of course he had.
He had stood beside the coffin.
He remembered white flowers.
Isabella’s mother crying.
The smell of polished wood.
He remembered touching Isabella’s hand.
Or had he?
Damian’s mind moved backward through grief.
The coffin had been closed.
He had demanded it opened.
Dr. Voss had refused.
The hospital claimed the embolism had caused complications that made viewing difficult.
Damian had been furious.
Dominic had convinced him not to fight.
“You never saw her after she died,” Cole said.
Damian’s face hardened.
“She died in my arms at the hospital.”
“No.”
“I was there.”
“You were there when she lost consciousness.”
Damian stepped toward him.
“Choose your next words carefully.”
Cole did.
“Isabella still had a pulse when they removed you from that room.”
Something inside Damian broke.
He remembered alarms.
Doctors.
Voss ordering security to escort him out.
Dominic holding him in the hallway.
Forty minutes later, Voss had emerged.
I’m sorry.
That was all.
Damian stared at the medical files.
“Where is Voss?”
Cole hesitated.
“Basement storage room.”
“Take me.”
Mara stepped forward.
“What about Sophie?”
Damian looked at the little girl.
She was studying the silver bracelet.
“Stay with her. Lock the nursery. Keep Noah with you.”
Mara nodded.
Damian and Cole entered another section of the hidden passage.
As they descended, Damian asked, “Who was the blue lady?”
Cole’s face tightened.
“I don’t know.”
“Sophie says she gave her Isabella’s bracelet.”
“I know.”
“You don’t find that important?”
“I find it terrifying.”
The basement room was locked.
Cole entered a code.
Inside, Dr. Gerald Voss sat tied to a chair.
His expensive shirt was soaked with blood from a wound near his shoulder.
He was conscious.
When he saw Damian, his face collapsed.
“You.”
Damian closed the door.
“Yes.”
Voss looked at Cole.
“You idiot.”
Damian pulled a chair forward and sat directly opposite the doctor.
“Tell me how my wife died.”
Voss began sweating.
“Pulmonary embolism.”
Damian struck him.
The chair nearly tipped.
“Try again.”
“I signed the report.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t kill her.”
Damian grabbed his collar.
“Then who did?”
Voss looked toward Cole.
Then at the camera mounted in the corner.
His terror increased.
“They’re watching.”
“Who?”
“You don’t understand.”
Damian leaned closer.
“I understand perfectly. My wife uncovered something. You helped bury it. Now someone is entering my son’s room.”
Voss whispered, “Not someone.”
Damian stopped.
“What?”
Voss’s eyes shifted toward the basement wall.
“She came back.”
Damian’s stomach tightened.
“Who?”
The doctor began shaking.
“I saw her.”
“Say the name.”
“I saw Isabella.”
Cole stepped forward.
“When?”
“Three nights ago.”
“Where?”
“Outside my house.”
Damian stared.
Voss continued.
“She wore blue.”
Damian almost hit him again.
Instead he sat back.
“You’re lying.”
“I wish I was.”
A phone began ringing.
Not Damian’s.
Not Cole’s.
The sound came from the table beside Voss.
A burner phone.
Cole picked it up.
Unknown caller.
Damian answered.
Nobody spoke.
Then a woman inhaled quietly.
Damian froze.
The sound was soft.
Familiar.
He had heard that breath beside him every night for six years.
“Damian?”
His heart stopped.
May you like
Isabella’s voice whispered his name.
Then the basement lights went out.
