Chapter 2 - The Black Case
Richard lunged toward the sofa.
Dad blocked him with one arm.
“Don't.”
It wasn't loud.
Richard stopped anyway.
Chief Mercer finally rose from the barbecue table.
“Everybody calm down.”
Dad didn't even look at him.
That was the first strange thing.
The second was Mercer's reaction.
For half a second, the chief stared at my father as though he recognized him.
Then he looked away.
Dad turned toward his pickup.
He reached through the open driver's window and pulled a small black case from beneath the dashboard.
I had never seen it before.
Richard laughed, but the sound was strained.
“What is that, old man?”
Dad opened the case only far enough to reach inside.
I heard one electronic tone.
A few seconds later, another signal answered faintly from somewhere beyond the estate gates.
Richard stopped smiling.
“What did you just call?”
Dad closed the case.
“The people your chief can't stop.”
Silence.
Chief Mercer's bourbon glass froze halfway to the table.
Richard turned toward him.
“Warren?”
Mercer didn't answer.
That scared Richard more than anything my father had done.
I pushed myself upright.
My hands were shaking, but I crawled toward the sofa and grabbed my phone.
The screen was cracked.
Still recording.
Richard stepped toward me.
“Give me that.”
“No.”
It was the first time I'd said that word to him without lowering my eyes afterward.
His face changed.
“You have no idea what you're doing.”
Actually, I did.
For three months, money had been disappearing from an investment account my mother left me when she died.
Richard insisted it was a banking error.
Then I discovered documents carrying my signature.
Except I had never signed them.
That morning, I'd confronted him.
He laughed.
Then he told me something far worse.
“If you leave me, Lily, you'll leave with nothing.”
So I hid my phone.
I needed him to repeat it.
But the recording had captured much more.
Richard's eyes moved toward the phone again.
Then Dad asked one quiet question.
“What exactly did he make you sign?”
My stomach tightened.
“I didn't sign anything.”
Chief Mercer suddenly set down his drink.
Dad looked at him.
May you like
And I realized the chief already knew what documents my father was talking about.
👉 One forged signature had started this nightmare—but the account attached to it was hiding something much bigger.
