Chapter 5 - LOCKED INSIDE MY OWN ROOM
Margaret swore under her breath.
Voss grabbed the doorknob and twisted hard.
“Ray!”
No one answered.
The bedroom had gone almost completely dark. Heavy curtains covered the windows, and the thin light around their edges was not enough to see faces.
Thomas switched on his phone flashlight.
“Everyone stay where you are.”
“I am not staying anywhere,” Voss snapped.
He drove his shoulder into the door. The frame held.
I pulled my phone from my blazer pocket.
No signal.
Margaret checked hers.
“Mine’s dead too.”
“A jammer,” Thomas said.
Voss turned toward him.
“That’s absurd.”
Thomas aimed the light at a rectangular device attached beneath the desk. A small red diode blinked on its surface.
Margaret stared at it.
“Is that legal?”
“Not used like this.”
I crossed the room and yanked the curtains open.
The windows had been screwed shut.
Outside, the front drive curved through rows of old maple trees. Voss’s car was still parked near the fountain. Margaret’s sedan sat behind it.
Ray’s black SUV was gone.
So was Diane’s car.
“They left,” Margaret said.
Thomas looked down at his watch.
“No. They relocated.”
“You sound very sure.”
“Because Ray wants the documents on the table, the camera recording, and the contents of this room. He would not abandon all three unless he believed he could control our exit.”
Voss paced once, then stopped himself.
“This has gone beyond any legal dispute.”
“It went beyond that before you arrived,” I said.
He looked at me.
For the first time that morning, the aggression left his face.
“I was told you had agreed in principle.”
“To surrender everything for one dollar?”
“I was told there was a separate settlement.”
“There wasn’t.”
Voss pressed two fingers to his forehead.
Margaret laughed without humor.
“You didn’t ask for a copy?”
“I was retained forty-eight hours ago.”
“By Diane?”
Voss did not answer.
Thomas’s light shifted toward the strip of blue cardboard behind the filing cabinet.
I knelt and pulled.
It did not move.
The folder was wedged between the steel cabinet and the wall. The cabinet weighed hundreds of pounds and had been bolted through the floorboards.
“Help me,” I said.
Thomas braced one shoulder against the cabinet. I took the other side. Margaret joined us.
Voss remained by the door.
“Those bolts won’t move.”
“They don’t have to,” I said.
The cabinet needed less than an inch of space.
We pushed together.
Metal groaned against wood.
One bolt tore free with a sharp crack. The cabinet tilted just enough for me to pull the folder loose.
It was not an accordion file.
It was a slim blue ledger.
My father’s initials were embossed on the cover.
HJP.
The first pages contained dates, bank transfers, names, and short notes written in his compact handwriting.
Some entries went back twelve years.
Diane—unauthorized withdrawal from household account.
Ray—vendor pressure, East Ridge contract.
Voss—meeting without board notice.
I looked up.
Voss had gone very still.
“You knew my father twelve years ago.”
His face tightened.
“I represented a subsidiary.”
“You said you were retained forty-eight hours ago.”
“For this matter.”
Margaret moved closer to read over my shoulder.
The entries became more detailed near the end.
Bellweather account opened using Claire’s identification.
Diane insists Claire requested funds.
Claire has not spoken to Diane in four months.
Ray met Voss at Fairmont garage.
Must move original trust outside house.
The last complete entry was dated the day before my father died.
T.V. has duplicate. If I fail to reach Claire, activate Northstar.
Below that, my father had written half a sentence.
The person directing Ray is—
The page had been torn out.
Voss reached for the ledger.
Thomas caught his wrist.
“Don’t.”
Voss’s face changed.
Not panic.
Decision.
He drove his elbow into Thomas’s chest and lunged for the book.
I stepped back, but my heel struck the filing cabinet. Voss’s hand closed around the ledger’s edge.
Margaret grabbed his suit jacket.
The book tore down the spine.
Several pages scattered across the floor.
One slid under the bed.
Voss snatched two loose sheets and shoved them inside his coat.
“What are you doing?” Margaret demanded.
“Protecting privileged material.”
“You just assaulted a trustee.”
Voss twisted free and struck the door with his fist.
“Open it!”
A mechanism buzzed.
The lock released immediately.
Someone had been listening.
Voss pulled the door open and ran into the hall.
Thomas started after him, but pain bent him forward.
I followed Voss to the staircase.
He reached the bottom, crossed the foyer, and stopped at the open front door.
A woman stood outside holding a phone at chest height.
She was filming him.
Voss backed away from the lens.
May you like
The woman looked past him directly at me.
“Claire,” she said, “your father hired me because he believed his death would be staged as an accident.”
