Chapter 6 - Phase Two
The security system switched to backup power.
My father pulled my mother away from the windows.
Detective Ruiz had stationed officers outside.
Within minutes, they searched the property.
The car was gone.
But someone had cut the main electrical line.
Flynn was sending a message.
He could still reach us.
The next morning, Ruiz showed me surveillance footage.
A hooded figure had approached the transformer.
Height matched Flynn.
Movement matched Flynn.
But no clear face.
“He wants us scared,” Ruiz said.
“He wants me making mistakes.”
She nodded.
“So don't.”
That became my strategy.
Flynn knew the frightened woman he had married.
He did not know the woman who had survived him.
I began reviewing everything.
Bank records.
Wedding expenses.
Emails.
Contracts.
Photographs.
Every romantic gesture became evidence.
Then I found something.
Six months before our wedding, Flynn had visited Switzerland.
He told me it was business.
Records showed he had met someone named Victor Sloane.
Ruiz knew the name.
Financial crimes.
Money laundering.
Asset concealment.
Suddenly three hundred million dollars was not simply an inheritance.
It was capital.
Flynn had promised money he did not yet possess.
Which meant other people might now want him dead too.
We traced Sloane to Miami.
Then another surprise arrived.
Fiona asked to speak with me.
I refused.
She asked again.
Ruiz said, “You should hear her.”
So I went.
Fiona looked twenty years older.
“I deserve whatever happens to me,” she said.
“Yes.”
She flinched.
“I thought Flynn was stealing your money. I told myself nobody would be physically hurt.”
“You heard him planning my murder.”
“I know.”
“And laughed.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“I was afraid of him.”
“You were afraid, so you helped him kill me?”
“No excuse.”
At least she understood that.
Then she slid a key across the table.
“What's this?”
“Safe-deposit box.”
“Where?”
“Boston.”
“What’s inside?”
“Flynn's real records.”
I stared at her.
“He kept evidence?”
“Insurance.”
Against Sloane.
Against Marcus.
Against Aidan.
Against everyone.
“Why tell me?”
“Because Flynn will kill us all if he thinks those records can hurt him.”
The safe-deposit box contained enough evidence to transform the case.
Payments.
Fake identities.
Messages.
And one document that made my father sit down.
A life insurance policy.
On me.
Two hundred million dollars.
Beneficiary: Flynn Mercer.
But another page showed something worse.
Contingent beneficiaries.
If Flynn died before receiving the money, payment transferred to a corporation controlled by Victor Sloane.
Flynn wasn't the mastermind.
He was disposable.
That night Ruiz received a report.
A body had been found near a marina.
Male.
Early thirties.
Gunshot wound.
For one terrible hour, we wondered if Flynn was dead.
Then fingerprints identified someone else.
Victor Sloane's employee.
In the dead man's pocket was a hotel key.
Ruiz searched the room.
Inside, officers found maps of my parents' property.
Photographs of me.
And a handwritten note.
MIDNIGHT FAILED.
COMPLETE PHASE TWO BEFORE TUESDAY.
I stared at those words.
“Flynn didn't write this.”
Ruiz agreed.
“Then who did?”
She looked at me.
“Someone who thinks Flynn still works for him.”
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
A photograph appeared.
Flynn.
Bruised.
Bleeding.
Tied to a chair.
Below it was a message.
BRING THE WATCH RECORDING IF YOU WANT YOUR HUSBAND ALIVE.
May you like
For the first time, Flynn needed me to save him.
And I had no idea whether letting him die would save my family—or sign our death warrants.
