Chapter 4 - The Man They Buried
Daniel sat down without realizing there was a chair behind him.
Nathan caught the backrest before it rolled.
“My father is dead.”
Rebecca kept the security image on her phone.
“Apparently someone who looks exactly like him isn't.”
“I identified his body.”
“Did you?”
Daniel looked at her.
“What kind of question is that?”
“A necessary one.”
“I stood beside the casket.”
“Was it open?”
“Yes.”
“You saw his face?”
“Yes.”
“You touched him?”
Daniel's anger appeared.
“Why would I touch my dead father?”
“Then don't say you verified his death.”
Daniel stared at her.
Nathan remembered Thomas's funeral.
Open casket.
Soft lighting.
Thomas had looked strangely smooth, almost waxen.
Nathan hadn't thought twice.
Funeral homes did things to bodies.
But now every memory looked different.
“Cause of death?” Rebecca asked.
“Heart attack,” Daniel said.
“Autopsy?”
“No. He had cardiac history.”
“Who signed the death certificate?”
Daniel frowned.
“I don't remember.”
“Find out.”
Rebecca sent the photograph to her team.
Nathan walked toward Claire's bedside.
She was exhausted.
He lowered sedation enough to keep her responsive without stressing her.
“Claire,” he said gently. “Did you see Thomas in person?”
She shook her head.
“Video only?”
Nod.
“When?”
She lifted five fingers.
“Five days ago?”
Nod.
“Where?”
Claire pointed weakly toward the board.
Nathan placed it beneath her hand.
WAREHOUSE.
“Did you go there?”
Nod.
Daniel stood.
“You went alone?”
Claire looked at him.
Nod.
He closed his eyes.
“Why wouldn't you tell me?”
She wrote.
DIDN'T KNOW WHO TO TRUST.
Daniel stared at those words for a long time.
Nathan could see the pain in his face.
And something else.
Understanding.
“You didn't trust me,” he whispered.
Claire's eyes filled with tears.
She wrote slowly.
I WANTED TO.
Nathan stepped back.
That sentence seemed to hurt Daniel more than an accusation would have.
Rebecca moved beside Claire.
“Can you tell me where the warehouse is?”
Claire wrote an address.
Rebecca handed it to an officer.
“Send a team. Quietly.”
She looked at Claire again.
“What happened there?”
Claire's hand trembled.
Nathan intervened.
“She's tired.”
“I need enough to keep her alive.”
Nathan hated that Rebecca was right.
“Claire, just the essential part. What did you see?”
Claire wrote.
FILES.
“What kind?”
MEDCORE.
“Anything else?”
VIDEO.
“What was on the video?”
Claire looked at Daniel.
Then wrote.
THOMAS.
“Was he speaking?”
Nod.
“What did he say?”
Claire tried to write.
The marker slipped from her fingers.
Nathan caught it.
“Enough.”
Rebecca didn't argue.
Nathan increased sedation.
Claire's eyes closed.
Daniel stood motionless.
“My father,” he whispered.
Nathan looked at him.
“What did you know about his death?”
“Nothing.”
“What happened that day?”
Daniel stared at the floor.
“He called me that morning.”
“About?”
“He wanted to meet.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“We were fighting.”
“About what?”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“My pharmacies.”
Nathan frowned.
“He wanted me to sell.”
“To whom?”
“A private investment group.”
“Connected to MedCore?”
“I didn't know then.”
“But now?”
“Yes.”
Nathan felt another piece moving into place.
“What happened after the call?”
“His assistant found him in his home office that afternoon. Paramedics came. He was pronounced dead.”
“Who was the assistant?”
“Marion Lowe.”
“Still alive?”
Daniel nodded.
“Lives in Arizona.”
Rebecca immediately asked for her contact information.
Daniel gave it.
Then Nathan asked the question that had been forming.
“Who arranged the funeral?”
“My father's attorney.”
“Name?”
Daniel looked at him.
“Victor Hale.”
Elliot Price, still handcuffed near the door, made a sharp sound.
Everyone turned.
Rebecca stepped toward him.
“You know him.”
Elliot's face had gone pale.
“He ran Project Forty-Seven.”
Daniel stood so fast the chair rolled backward.
“What?”
Elliot looked at him.
“Victor Hale wasn't just your father's attorney.”
“What was he?”
“MedCore's internal counsel.”
Nathan stared.
“The man protecting the company.”
“The man protecting himself,” Elliot said.
Rebecca narrowed her eyes.
“Where is he now?”
Daniel spoke first.
“New York.”
Elliot shook his head.
“No.”
Daniel looked at him.
“What?”
“He moved back here last year.”
“To where?”
“I don't know.”
Rebecca's phone rang again.
The police team had reached the warehouse.
Empty.
Recently cleared.
But not completely.
They found burned paperwork.
A dismantled computer.
And a chair with leather restraints.
Nathan listened from beside Claire's bed.
Rebecca asked, “Any blood?”
A pause.
“Take samples.”
Another pause.
“Anything else?”
Her expression hardened.
“What name?”
She looked at Daniel.
“They found a shipping manifest.”
“For what?”
“Medical adhesive compounds.”
Nathan stepped closer.
“From where?”
Rebecca listened.
“Lakeside Pharmacy.”
Daniel went white.
“My pharmacy?”
“Your signature is on the order.”
“I never ordered that.”
“Date?”
Rebecca asked.
Then looked at him.
“Three months ago.”
Daniel shook his head.
“No.”
“Digital or handwritten?”
“Handwritten.”
“Anyone could copy it.”
“Maybe.”
Nathan thought of the blue 47 on the patch.
“What exactly was shipped?”
Rebecca repeated the question into the phone.
The answer made Elliot close his eyes.
“Experimental polymer sheets,” Rebecca said.
Nathan stared.
“For transdermal delivery.”
Elliot nodded.
“Project Forty-Seven used that type of substrate.”
Rebecca looked at Daniel.
“Someone used your pharmacy to obtain materials.”
“And my access code.”
“And your signature.”
Daniel rubbed his temples.
“They're framing me.”
Nathan studied him.
A few hours earlier he had suspected his best friend might have poisoned his wife.
Now the evidence pointed toward something more elaborate.
Someone wanted Claire dead.
And wanted Daniel blamed.
“Why?” Nathan asked.
Daniel looked at him.
“If Claire dies and the evidence points to me, no one listens to anything she discovered.”
Rebecca nodded.
“Exactly.”
Nathan felt ashamed of how quickly the trap had worked.
Even on him.
“Daniel.”
His friend looked up.
Nathan didn't apologize.
Not yet.
There wasn't time.
“We find out who did this.”
Daniel's eyes filled.
“We save Claire first.”
“We're doing both.”
At 3:40 a.m., Rebecca received confirmation from county records.
Thomas Bennett's death certificate had been signed by Dr. Harold Crane.
Nathan knew the name.
“Crane died two years ago.”
Rebecca looked at him.
“You knew him?”
“Cardiologist. Lost his license briefly over record falsification.”
“Interesting.”
Daniel looked sick.
“The funeral home?”
Rebecca checked.
“Closed four years ago after bankruptcy.”
“Who owned it?”
She scrolled.
Then stopped.
“Shell company.”
“Parent?”
“Another shell.”
Elliot laughed once.
“Victor always liked layers.”
Rebecca looked at him.
“You seem to know Victor well.”
“I testified against MedCore internally.”
“And survived?”
“Barely.”
“What happened?”
“They destroyed my career.”
“You're chief pharmacist at a major hospital.”
“After twelve years rebuilding it.”
Nathan looked at Elliot differently.
“Why didn't you expose everything?”
“I tried.”
“And?”
“My files disappeared. Witnesses changed stories. One died.”
“Maya's mother?”
Elliot nodded.
Maya stood across the room.
Her face was dry now.
The grief had hardened into something else.
“What's my mother's name in the files?”
“Teresa Torres.”
“Did she know Thomas Bennett?”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
Elliot hesitated.
“Very.”
Daniel looked up.
“What does that mean?”
“She worked directly with your father.”
Maya stared.
“My mother?”
“She became convinced Thomas wanted to shut Project Forty-Seven down.”
Daniel blinked.
“My father financed it.”
“At first.”
“And later?”
“He realized Victor was using human subjects without proper authorization.”
Nathan's stomach turned.
“Patients?”
“Some.”
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
Rebecca stared at him.
“Those three words are becoming irritating.”
Elliot met her gaze.
“I spent twenty years trying not to remember.”
“Tonight you start.”
At 4:12 a.m., Claire's blood pressure stabilized enough for Nathan to consider moving her to intensive care.
He remained beside her.
He should have handed her to another attending.
He couldn't.
This was no longer ordinary medicine.
Someone had invaded his hospital.
Stolen evidence from his pocket.
Used pharmaceutical knowledge to nearly kill a woman he cared about.
Nathan would not leave.
His phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
A photograph appeared.
Claire's daughter Emma leaving school two days earlier.
Nathan's chest tightened.
Another photograph.
Claire's son Noah at soccer practice.
Then a message.
STOP DIGGING.
Nathan immediately showed Rebecca.
Her face changed.
“Where are the children?”
“With Daniel's sister.”
“Address?”
Daniel gave it.
Rebecca dispatched officers.
Daniel looked terrified.
“They know where my kids are.”
“They've known for days,” Nathan said.
Daniel stared at the photos.
“Claire was trying to protect us.”
Nathan nodded.
“And someone was watching all of you.”
A third message arrived.
THIS IS YOUR ONLY WARNING.
Rebecca typed quickly to her cyber unit.
Nathan looked at the sender information.
“Can they trace it?”
“Probably not quickly.”
Then another message appeared.
Not text.
A video file.
Rebecca stopped him before he opened it.
“Send it to me.”
He forwarded it.
Her technicians scanned it remotely.
“No obvious malware,” she said.
“Play it.”
They gathered around the phone.
The video began in darkness.
Then a light switched on.
A man sat behind a desk.
Older.
Silver hair.
Nathan recognized him instantly.
Thomas Bennett.
Daniel made a broken sound.
The dead man leaned toward the camera.
“If Claire found this video,” he said, “then Victor knows the archive survived.”
Daniel gripped Nathan's arm.
Thomas continued.
“Daniel, if you are watching this, I need you to understand something. I made terrible choices. I funded a project I believed would save lives. By the time I understood what Victor had turned it into, people had already died.”
Daniel's knees weakened.
Nathan held him upright.
Thomas looked directly into the camera.
“I tried to stop him.”
The video flickered.
“I failed.”
Another distortion.
“But I left evidence.”
Rebecca leaned closer.
“Where?”
As if answering her, Thomas said, “The archive isn't in the warehouse. It was never in my house. Victor knows me too well.”
Daniel whispered, “Dad...”
Thomas continued.
“I hid it with the one person Victor would never suspect.”
The screen went black.
Nathan waited.
Nothing.
“That's it?” Rebecca said.
Daniel shook his head.
“No. There has to be more.”
The video resumed.
Thomas appeared closer to the camera.
“If Nathan Cole is with you, tell him I'm sorry.”
Nathan froze.
Everyone turned toward him.
His mouth went dry.
Thomas Bennett had recorded this years ago.
Why would he mention Nathan?
Thomas's final words came slowly.
“Because the archive belongs to his father.”
Nathan stopped breathing.
“My father?”
His father, Samuel Cole, had died when Nathan was sixteen.
A construction accident.
At least, that was what Nathan had always been told.
The video cut out.
Then the hospital intercom crackled.
A security officer's voice came through.
“Dr. Cole, you have a visitor at the ICU entrance.”
Rebecca immediately reached for her weapon.
“Name?”
The intercom clicked again.
The guard sounded confused.
“He says his name is Samuel Cole.”
Nathan stared at the speaker.
His father had been dead for twenty-nine years.
May you like
Then the ICU doors opened.
And an old man stepped through.
