Chapter 11 - The Enemy Without a Name
I wanted to tear the photograph in half.
Instead, I gave it to Mercer.
Within an hour, Sterling Tower went into restricted security.
Andrew hated it.
“We spent eleven years hiding.”
“I spent eleven years thinking you were dead,” I reminded him. “You can tolerate security cameras.”
Matthew traced the envelope through postal processing.
Nothing useful.
No fingerprints.
No clean surveillance image.
Whoever sent it understood investigations.
Mercer believed Northstar might be a former government contractor rather than an official.
The financial records suggested someone who had moved between public and private sectors for decades.
Then Edward disappeared.
His attorney called.
Edward had missed a scheduled meeting.
His car was found in a parking garage.
Phone inside.
No Edward.
Police initially treated it cautiously.
Then Matthew received a call.
Edward.
His voice sounded strained.
“Valerie.”
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m alive.”
A second voice ordered him to continue.
Edward breathed slowly.
“They want the original ledger.”
“We gave it to federal investigators.”
“I told them.”
A pause.
“They don’t believe me.”
The line went dead.
Andrew looked at me.
“This could be a trap.”
“It probably is.”
Mercer agreed.
But the kidnappers had made one mistake.
Edward’s phone remained in his abandoned car.
The call had come through another device.
Investigators traced its routing pattern to a group of commercial repeaters.
Matthew narrowed the likely area to an industrial district outside Dallas.
I wanted to go.
Mercer refused.
For once, I listened.
Teams entered the warehouse shortly before dawn.
Edward was found alive.
Bruised.
Exhausted.
But alive.
The kidnappers had fled minutes earlier.
One was captured nearby.
His name was Samuel Pike.
Former corporate investigator.
His financial history contained payments from a consulting firm.
Northstar Strategic Solutions.
The name had been hiding in plain sight.
The company’s founder was seventy-two-year-old Graham North.
Former attorney.
Former federal contracting adviser.
And an old friend of Victor Calder.
Mercer stared at North’s photograph.
“I know him.”
Andrew laughed bitterly.
“Of course you do.”
Mercer ignored the comment.
“North was present during the original investigation.”
“Was he the leak?”
“We never proved it.”
Now we had a chance.
Pike agreed to cooperate.
North had ordered him to retrieve the ledger because it contained transaction codes capable of linking North to Calder’s earliest schemes.
Investigators prepared warrants.
But when they reached North’s estate, it was empty.
On his desk sat one object.
A silver Guardian medal.
Exactly like mine.
Attached was a note.
Charles wasn’t the only man people owed favors.
The medal had saved me.
May you like
Now someone else intended to use the same network against us.
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