Chapter 5 - The Reckoning Begins
The Great Room was silent now, save for the crackle of the dying fire.
Two deputies stood guard by the shattered dining table, while Maria and Hannah, our beloved nannies, stood in the center of the kitchen with tears streaming down their faces, preparing large pots of homemade chicken soup and hot chocolate.
When Hannah saw me walk through the kitchen doors, she dropped her wooden spoon and threw her arms around me, sobbing uncontrollably.
"Mr. Mercer... Mr. Alex, I am so sorry!" she wept against my shoulder. "She told us you gave the order! She showed us a legal letter with your signature, saying we were terminated for stealing! She said if we tried to see the girls, she would have ICE detain my family! We didn't know what to do!"
"I know, Hannah. I know," I said gently, patting her back. "It was all a lie. She forged everything. You're home now. You and Maria have your jobs for life, do you hear me? You are family."
Maria wiped her eyes, nodding fiercely. "The girls... they asked for their warm milk with honey. Just like Claire used to make. We brought their favorite quilts from the storage chests."
"Take it up to them," I said, my voice softening. "I need to finish this."
I walked outside to the circular driveway.
Snow was falling faster now, dusting the roofs of four sheriff’s cruisers parked with their lightbars flashing in the crisp night.
Inside the cage of the lead patrol vehicle, Vanessa was thrashing against the seatbelt, screaming obscenities through the reinforced glass. When she saw me approach, her thrashing stopped.
Detective Vance opened the rear door of the cruiser.
Vanessa glared at me, her hair matted, her mascara completely ruined, her twenty-thousand-dollar designer dress torn at the shoulder. The diamond necklace had already been cataloged as evidence and removed from her neck.
"Alex!" she hissed, trying to lunge forward, only to be snapped back by the handcuffs securing her wrists behind her back. "You have to call off this circus! Julian is a psychopath! He forced me into this! He threatened to kill me if I didn't help him get your files!"
"Save your breath, Vanessa," I said, standing three feet from the open door, looking down at her with nothing but cold disgust. "Croft gave up your Cayman accounts. He gave up the wire transfers from Macau. He gave up the staged 'heating failure' plan."
Her face went from rage to complete, hollow terror. The color drained from her lips until she looked like a ghost under the flashing red strobes.
"Alex... please," she whimpered, her voice dropping into a desperate, pleading whine. "I made a mistake. I was so lonely here! You were always working! You left me alone in this giant, empty house with four children that weren't even mine! I couldn't handle it! Claire was everywhere... her pictures, her piano, her memory... you never loved me! You just wanted a babysitter with a pretty face!"
"I wanted a mother for my daughters," I replied, every word landing like a stone. "I gave you my trust. I gave you my home. I gave you everything you asked for. And you put five-year-old girls in a freezing room and fed them garbage while you danced on my table."
"They're not even your real daughters!" she shrieked, the venom suddenly breaking through her pathetic act, her eyes wild with pure malice. "Sophie and Grace are bastards from Claire's dead sister! And the twins are just weak, crying little leeches! You're going to spend the rest of your pathetic life changing diapers and mourning a dead woman while I—"
*Slam.*
I kicked the patrol car door shut, cutting off her screeching voice behind the reinforced glass.
I looked at Detective Vance. "Charge her with four counts of attempted aggravated homicide, felony child endangerment, corporate espionage, and grand theft. Do not let her post bail. I will hire every prosecutor in the state of Nevada to ensure she spends the next forty years in a federal penitentiary."
Vance nodded grimly. "With the evidence Apex provided, Alex, she'll never see daylight outside of a prison yard again. Get inside. Take care of those girls."
I watched the red taillights of the cruisers wind down the snowy mountain road until the siren wails faded into the whispering pines.
I walked back into the warmth of the estate.
Upstairs, in the master bedroom suite, a roaring fire danced behind the brass hearth screen. Hannah and Maria had set up four soft, plush feather beds side-by-side in front of the flames, piled high with Claire’s favorite hand-quilted blankets.
The girls were sitting up, wearing clean flannel pajamas, their cheeks flushed with healthy pink warmth as they sipped their mugs of milk and honey.
When I entered the room, all four of them looked up.
"Daddy!" Emma called out, her voice stronger now, the terrifying tremor finally gone.
I sat down on the edge of Emma and Lucy’s mattress. Immediately, Grace crawled into my lap, burying her face into my chest, while Sophie wrapped both arms around my forearm. Emma and Lucy leaned against my shoulders on either side.
"Is the bad lady gone?" Sophie whispered.
"She’s gone, baby," I said, resting my chin on Grace’s soft curls. "She’s gone forever. She can never, ever come back here."
"And the men in uniforms?" Lucy asked timidly.
"They took her away because she was bad," I explained gently. "They protect good girls like you. And Hannah and Maria are downstairs making pancakes for Christmas morning."
Emma looked down at the carpet, her little fingers fiddling with the hem of her blanket. "Daddy... did Santa still come? Or was he mad at us too?"
My heart swelled, aching with a love so fierce it made my eyes sting.
I reached behind the bedside table and produced two of the brightly wrapped boxes from my luggage—boxes wrapped in shiny red paper with giant golden bows.
"Santa didn't forget you, Emma," I said softly, placing the boxes in their laps. "In fact, Santa left six giant bags down in the foyer. But he told me that before you open anything, I had to give you the most important present of all."
"What is it?" Grace asked, looking up at me with Claire’s luminous eyes.
"A promise," I said, looking at each of my four beautiful daughters in turn. "I closed the deal in Texas. I sold the company. I don't have to travel anymore. I'm staying right here. Every breakfast. every bedtime story, every thunderstorm. I am never leaving you again."
Emma threw her arms around my neck, sobbing tears of pure relief, and within seconds, all four girls were clinging to me, laughing and crying together in the firelight.
For two hours, we sat by the fire, opening presents, eating warm soup, and listening to the wind howl harmlessly against the heavy glass. Eventually, one by one, their eyelids grew heavy, their breathing slowing into deep, peaceful sleep, safe under their mother's quilts.
I sat watching them sleep until the grandfather clock in the hall struck three in the morning.
My encrypted phone vibrated silently against my hip.
I pulled it from my pocket and stepped quietly out onto the landing. It was a secure text message from Liam Cross.
*Alex. We just finished the forensic scrub of Croft’s laptop and the Macau transaction logs.*
I typed back: *Did you confirm the wire transfer destination?*
Liam’s reply came three seconds later, chilling my blood anew:
*The Cayman account didn't belong to Vanessa. She was only an authorized signatory. The account belongs to an offshore shell corporation registered in Delaware.*
My fingers hovered over the screen. *Who owns the Delaware shell, Liam?*
*The majority shareholder is Marcus Vance’s supervisor, County Commissioner Robert Sterling. And the seed funding for the entire operation didn't come from Reno.*
May you like
A document attachment downloaded to my screen. It was a bank transfer receipt dated four months ago.
*The wire transfer that hired Julian Croft came directly from inside your own boardroom, Alex. The transfer was authorized by Arthur Pendelton. Your CFO. And your late wife's brother.*
