Chapter 11 - Toby's Last Message
The address was Mercer’s Kettle.
Kaye stared at Laura.
“We're already here.”
Laura smiled.
“Exactly.”
Dominic understood.
“Below us.”
The old basement.
Kaye ran.
The basement had always ended at a brick wall.
But her father had built the diner.
She searched.
Behind a shelf, Dominic found a release.
The wall moved.
A tunnel descended beneath the building.
Water roared below.
“Toby!”
“Mom!”
Kaye ran toward his voice.
Dominic followed.
They reached a steel chamber.
Toby stood inside.
Water reached his knees.
The door required a code.
Kaye entered every number she knew.
Wrong.
Toby pressed his hands against the glass.
“Mom!”
“I'm here!”
Dominic searched for another mechanism.
Nothing.
Kaye remembered the trust instructions.
Remember the missing R.
She entered the numerical value of R.
Then Toby's birthday.
The lock clicked.
Dominic pulled the door.
Water exploded outward.
Kaye caught Toby.
He was shaking.
But alive.
Laura was gone when they returned upstairs.
She had taken the envelope.
Not the access phrase.
Kaye still had that.
Toby wrapped himself in blankets.
“I left clues.”
“I found them.”
“The dinosaurs?”
“All of them.”
He smiled weakly.
Dominic crouched.
“You were very brave.”
Toby looked at him.
“I was scared.”
“So was I.”
“Really?”
“Terrified.”
Toby considered this.
“Mom says being scared doesn't mean you're chicken.”
Kaye smiled.
“She does.”
Toby looked toward Evan.
“Are you staying?”
Evan couldn't answer.
Kaye could.
“He has things to make right.”
Evan nodded.
“A lot.”
Police arrived.
This time, Dominic didn't disappear.
He handed over evidence.
All of it.
Even evidence that could expose his own organization.
Mateo stared at him.
“Boss?”
“It's finished.”
“What is?”
“This life.”
Mateo said nothing.
Dominic looked at Kaye.
“I owe the boy more than revenge.”
For the first time, Kaye believed him.
Then Toby tugged her sleeve.
“Mom.”
“What?”
“The lady wasn't alone.”
Kaye crouched.
“Laura?”
Toby nodded.
“Who was with her?”
“I couldn't see him.”
“Did you hear anything?”
“He called her Rebecca.”
Dominic and Kaye exchanged looks.
Rebecca Sloan.
Still missing.
Toby continued.
“And she called him something.”
“What?”
“Boss.”
Dominic froze.
Laura wasn't running the operation.
Neither was August.
Someone above them had orchestrated everything.
Dominic's ambush.
Michael's disappearance.
Toby.
Kaye's trust.
All of it.
A phone rang on the counter.
Dominic answered.
His expression changed.
“Who is this?”
He listened.
Then slowly handed the phone to Kaye.
A man's voice spoke.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
Kaye stopped breathing.
Only one person had ever called her that.
May you like
Her father had been dead for eighteen years.
And now he was asking her to come home...
