For one terrible second after the emergency lights returned, Mara could hear nothing except the ringing in her ears. Then Elias groaned. He lay on his side, one hand pressed against the blood spreading beneath his ribs.
Mercer dropped beside him. “Where were you hit?”
Elias tried to answer, but his breath caught. Mercer pulled back the torn fabric of his jacket and found the wound just below the shoulder. The bullet had passed through.
“You're lucky,” Mercer said.
Elias gave a strained laugh. “I've never liked being called lucky.”
Mara was still staring at the door.
NOW YOU KNOW WHO BETRAYED JONAH.
The letters looked almost black beneath the emergency light.
“Mercer,” she whispered.
“I see it.”
“No.” She pointed toward the floor. “The paint.”
A narrow trail of red drops led away from the door.
They were not blood.
Mara crouched and touched one with a fingertip. The substance was thick and sticky.
“Paint,” she said.
Mercer looked toward the dark passage. “Whoever wrote that had time to do it.”
“And the gunshot?” Mara asked.
“Was meant to make us panic.”
Elias pushed himself upright against the wall.
“No,” he said.
Mara turned.
His face had gone gray.
“That shot wasn't meant to scare us.”
Mercer looked at him.
“Then what was it for?”
Elias pointed weakly toward the floor.
“The bullet.”
Mercer found it embedded in the opposite wall. He dug it out with a pocket tool and examined it under the emergency light.
Elias swallowed.
“That's not a police round.”
Mercer stared at the cartridge.
“How do you know?”
“Because I supplied them.”
Silence.
Mara looked between them.
“You supplied ammunition to the police?”
“Years ago.”
“For this operation?”
Elias shook his head.
“For the security company that once protected this property.”
Mercer stood.
“Then someone used an old weapon.”
“Or someone wanted us to think they did.”
A sharp metallic bang came from above.
Mara flinched.
Mercer looked toward the ladder.
“The cottage.”
Smoke began creeping beneath the upper hatch.
Elias swore.
“Fire.”
Mercer grabbed Mara's arm.
“Move.”
They rushed through the passage. Elias stumbled behind them, one hand pressed against his wound. The smoke thickened as they climbed. By the time Mercer pushed open the hatch, the smell of burning wood and chemicals filled the air.
The cottage was on fire.
Flames crawled along the curtains in the sitting room. The front hallway was already hazy. Somewhere upstairs, glass shattered.
Mara stopped.
“My father's papers.”
Mercer caught her shoulder.
“Leave them.”
“They're in the bedroom.”
“Mara!”
She pulled free.
“If those records burn, everything ends.”
She ran.
Mercer followed, cursing under his breath.
The bedroom door was hot beneath Mara's hand. She opened it and was hit by a wave of smoke. The floorboard beside the bed stood open, exposing the hidden cavity.
Inside, the folder marked VALE, THOMAS was still there.
Mara grabbed it.
A second object lay beneath it.
A small brass key.
She recognized it immediately.
Not the key Mercer had found.
This one was longer.
Its bow carried the same three-knock symbol her father had used.
She stuffed it into her pocket.
Mercer dragged her toward the door.
“Now!”
They stumbled outside.
Cold lake air struck Mara's face.
Behind them, smoke poured from the windows.
Elias emerged last, supported by the second officer's abandoned doorway rail. His shirt was dark with blood.
Mara looked toward the road.
The officer was gone.
So was the black case.
“Mercer,” she said.
“I know.”
“He took the case.”
Mercer looked toward the tree line.
“No car.”
“He could have taken the boat.”
They ran toward the dock.
The lake was calm.
Too calm.
A small motorboat moved away from the shore.
Someone was driving it.
Mercer raised his radio.
“Unit two, intercept vessel moving east from the Vale cottage.”
Static answered.
He tried again.
Nothing.
Mara looked at him.
“Your radio isn't working.”
“Not mine.”
He stared at the device.
“Someone jammed the signal.”
Elias leaned against a post.
“The second officer knew exactly what he was doing.”
Mara turned.
“You said you didn't know who betrayed Jonah.”
Elias looked at her.
“I said I didn't know which of us Jonah meant.”
“And now?”
His eyes moved toward the disappearing boat.
“Now I do.”
Mercer looked at him.
“Who?”
Elias's face tightened.
“Officer Nathan Bell.”
Mara remembered the man's pale face beneath the emergency lights.
“He knew about the tunnel.”
“He knew more than that,” Elias said.
“He was afraid.”
“He should be.”
Mercer looked at the burning cottage.
“Why would Bell work for them?”
Elias took a slow breath.
“Because twelve years ago, he was one of the young officers assigned to your father's case.”
Mara went still.
“My father didn't have a police investigation.”
“He did.”
Mercer looked at Elias sharply.
“Why wasn't it in the records?”
“Because someone removed it.”
“Who?”
Elias looked at Mara.
“Your father's final report named a police officer.”
Mara felt the brass key against her leg.
“Who?”
“That's what Jonah was trying to recover.”
Mercer frowned.
“Then why would Bell kill him?”
“He didn't.”
Mara stared.
“What?”
Elias's voice dropped.
“Bell wasn't the betrayer. He was following orders.”
Mercer looked toward the lake.
“Whose?”
Before Elias could answer, a vehicle appeared on the road.
Mara stepped back.
It was an old dark SUV.
It stopped beside the cottage.
A woman got out.
She wore a long gray coat and carried no weapon.
Mara knew her.
She had seen her photograph in her father's file.
“Who is that?” Mercer asked.
Mara could barely speak.
“My father's lawyer.”
The woman looked at the burning cottage.
Then at Mara.
“You finally found the tunnel.”
Mara stepped toward her.
“Who are you working for?”
The woman looked toward Elias.
“Ask him.”
Elias closed his eyes.
The woman continued.
“Ask him why Jonah trusted him.”
Mara's expression hardened.
“Tell me.”
Elias looked at her.
“Jonah trusted me because I betrayed him first.”
The confession landed harder than the gunshot.
Mara stared at him.
“What did you do?”
“I gave them the location of the tunnel.”
“Why?”
“Because they had your father.”
Mara shook her head.
“My father was dead.”
“Not then.”
She stared at him.
Elias continued.
“Thomas was alive when I gave them the location.”
Mara's face crumpled.
“How long?”
“Three weeks.”
“And you knew?”
“Yes.”
“You let me believe he was dead.”
“I thought I could get him out.”
“But you didn't.”
“No.”
The woman beside the SUV stepped forward.
“He tried.”
Mara looked at her.
“Who killed my father?”
The woman hesitated.
Then she answered.
“Your father wasn't killed in the way you were told.”
Mara felt the world tilt.
“Then what happened?”
The woman looked toward the burning cottage.
“He disappeared.”
Mara's voice became almost inaudible.
“For twelve years?”
“Yes.”
Mercer stared at Elias.
“Where is Thomas now?”
Nobody answered.
Then a sound came from the lake.
Three knocks.
Not on the door.
From beneath the dock.
Mara turned.
The hidden signal.
Three knocks.
Pause.
Three knocks.
The woman whispered, “He's here.”
Mara ran toward the water.
Under the dock, something moved.
A hand appeared around the edge of the old hatch.
Then a man's face rose into view.
Older.
Thinner.
But unmistakable.
Mara stopped breathing.
Her father looked at her.
And after twelve years, Thomas Vale said the first words she had ever imagined hearing again.
“Mara, don't trust Mercer.”
Click Here to continue read next: PART6: Thomas Vale Returned From Twelve Years of Silence With One Warning, and Mara Had to Decide Which Man Had Been Lying Since the Beginning
The Police Arrived Before Sunrise, Yet the Woman Already Knew Exactly What They Had Come to Ask Her About
Part 5 of 16
