Chapter 9 - The Father Who Refused to Stay Dead
Conrad pushed Fay behind the kitchen island.
Security flooded the house.
No intruder.
Instead, someone had triggered the alarm remotely.
A message appeared across every security monitor.
HELLO, SON.
Conrad stared.
Fay watched his face empty.
Victor Harwick had been declared dead after a private plane crashed over Lake Michigan.
No body had been recovered.
Conrad had accepted the death because wreckage carried Victor's belongings and dental fragments matched his records.
Now those records looked less convincing.
A video opened.
Victor appeared.
Older.
Thin.
Very much alive.
“You've disappointed me, Conrad.”
Fay felt Conrad's hand tighten around the counter.
Victor spoke about weakness.
Legacy.
Blood.
Then he mentioned Fay.
“You married exactly the wrong woman.”
Conrad stepped closer to the screen.
Victor smiled.
“She made you sentimental.”
The video ended.
Fay looked at Conrad.
“Say something.”
“I spent my entire life trying not to become him.”
“You didn't.”
“You don't know everything I've done.”
“I know enough.”
“No.”
He turned toward her.
“You know the version I allowed you to see.”
“Then show me the rest.”
He stared.
“No.”
Fay almost laughed.
“Have you learned nothing?”
His expression broke slightly.
She approached.
“Show me.”
So he did.
Conrad told her about men he had threatened.
Businesses he had forced into agreements.
Violence he had ordered.
People he had frightened because fear was efficient.
He did not make himself innocent.
Fay listened.
When he finished, he looked almost certain she would leave.
Instead she said, “Do you want to keep being that man?”
“No.”
“Then don't.”
“It isn't that simple.”
“No. It's harder.”
She touched his hand.
“But hard isn't impossible.”
The hunt for Victor began.
Federal investigators became involved.
Conrad opened records he had spent years protecting.
Every disclosure weakened his organization.
He continued anyway.
Then Victor struck somewhere Conrad hadn't expected.
Rosa's shop burned.
Rosa survived.
Barely.
Fay sat beside her hospital bed.
Rosa squeezed her fingers.
“Don't cry over my sewing machines.”
“I liked those sewing machines.”
“They were older than you.”
“That's why.”
Rosa smiled weakly.
Then became serious.
“He came himself.”
“Victor?”
“I don't know. Old man. Expensive coat.”
“What did he want?”
“The pattern.”
Fay frowned.
“What pattern?”
“Your green dress.”
Conrad, standing nearby, went still.
Rosa explained that Kathleen had visited weeks earlier.
She had sewn something into the dress lining.
Fay looked down.
She was wearing it.
Conrad closed the hospital-room door.
Fay removed the dress in the bathroom and changed into hospital scrubs.
Rosa showed them where to cut.
Inside the hem was a tiny memory card.
Conrad inserted it into an isolated laptop.
Files appeared.
Accounts.
Names.
Recordings.
Then one folder.
FAY.
Inside were photographs of Fay taken throughout her life.
School.
College.
Her diner.
Her father's house.
Someone had watched her for decades.
Fay covered her mouth.
Conrad clicked the final image.
Taken yesterday.
Fay sleeping.
Inside the townhouse.
Conrad stood so quickly the chair fell.
“He's been inside.”
Luca checked security.
Nothing.
No breach.
Which meant someone currently trusted had taken the photograph.
They returned home and locked down every employee.
One by one.
Cook.
Housekeeper.
Driver.
Security.
Then Fay noticed something.
The angle of the photograph.
Bedroom doorway.
Waist height.
Not a hidden camera.
A person.
She remembered waking briefly.
Seeing a silhouette.
Assuming it was Conrad.
But Conrad had been downstairs.
“Who was on night duty?”
Luca checked.
His face changed.
“Your mother.”
Fay stared.
“Kathleen?”
“She asked to stay overnight.”
Conrad called her.
No answer.
They searched the guest room.
Empty.
On the bed lay a note.
Fay opened it.
I am sorry. He gave me no choice.
Below it was an address.
And a warning.
COME WITHOUT CONRAD OR HE DIES.
Fay looked up.
Conrad said, “You're not going.”
She folded the note.
“Yes, I am.”
He stepped toward her.
“Fay.”
She kissed him.
For the first time.
Conrad froze.
So did she.
The kiss lasted only seconds.
When she stepped back, his expression had changed completely.
“That,” he said quietly, “was unfair.”
“I know.”
Then the lights went out.
May you like
A door opened upstairs.
And Victor Harwick's voice called down, “Conrad. Come say hello to your father.”
