Chương 13
The call ended.
Five minutes later, the patrol car outside Daniel’s house switched on its emergency lights.
An officer ran toward the front door.
Daniel was already moving when his phone rang.
The caller ID showed Lily’s number.
Her missing phone.
He answered.
Grant Ellison said, “Put me on speaker.”
Daniel stopped in the hallway.
Karen looked at him. Lily sat upright in the study doorway, her tablet on her lap.
Daniel activated the speaker.
Grant’s voice was rough and breathless. “I have something Lily wants.”
“The memory card?” Daniel asked.
“The only copy that matters.”
“We recovered Jonah’s drive.”
A pause.
Grant said, “No, you didn’t.”
Daniel saw Lily’s eye change.
“He is lying,” Karen whispered.
Grant continued. “The drive has backups. It doesn’t show sample custody. The card does.”
“What do you want?”
“A car and time.”
“You think I can give you either?”
“You can stop the police from closing every road.”
“No, I can’t.”
“You’re a colonel.”
“That means less than you think.”
Grant laughed, a tired sound without humor. “It always means less when people need something.”
Daniel heard wind and a metallic rattle. He tried to identify the background.
“Where are you?”
“Tell the detective I’ll trade the card for safe passage.”
“You attacked my daughter.”
“I lost control.”
Lily struck her tablet.
The synthetic voice said, “YOU CHOSE.”
Silence followed.
Grant said, “Lily?”
She typed.
“YOU HIT ME SIX TIMES.”
“I know.”
“YOU TOOK MY PHONE.”
“I was trying to contain what you stole.”
“MY DATA.”
“Vale’s lab. Bradley’s equipment.”
“MY FACE.”
Grant began speaking quickly. “You don’t understand what was at stake. Hundreds of jobs. Years of research. One bad round of samples could destroy—”
The tablet interrupted him.
“YOU HIT ME AFTER I FELL.”
Grant stopped.
Daniel looked at the patrol officer, who had entered quietly and was signaling for him to keep Grant talking. Karen texted Soto from her own phone.
“What do you want from Lily?” Daniel asked.
“The passcode.”
“To what?”
“The encrypted folder on the card.”
Lily stared at the phone.
Grant had the memory card but could not open its protected files.
“You already have the lab records,” Daniel said.
“Not her notes. She made notes about chain of custody. Dates, transfers, names.”
“Who are you protecting?”
“Give me the code.”
Lily typed, “NO.”
Grant’s breathing sharpened.
“Lily, listen to me. Vale will blame everything on us. Voss will say she never understood the science. Rusk is already trading me for his pension. Those notes can prove Vale directed the changes.”
“Then give them to police,” Daniel said.
“You think I’ll survive that?”
“You’re asking the wrong family for sympathy.”
“I’m asking Lily to understand. She knows what Vale did.”
The tablet said, “YOU COULD HAVE TOLD TRUTH.”
“And lose everything?”
“YES.”
Grant made a sound between a laugh and a cough.
Daniel heard a distant bell behind him on the call. Three slow strikes, then a pause.
Lily looked at him.
He knew that bell.
Bradley’s old chapel clock struck every quarter hour. Daniel had heard it during parent orientation while Lily pretended not to cry about him leaving.
Grant was still near campus.
The metallic rattle might be a loose ventilation panel. Wind rushed through an enclosed space.
Daniel looked toward the officer and mouthed chapel.
The officer relayed it.
Grant said, “Tell the police to back off.”
“They’re not listening to me.”
“Then make them.”
“I can’t.”
“You made men cross deserts.”
“I ordered soldiers. Not police.”
“You always get people to move.”
The accusation sounded strangely personal until Daniel recognized that Grant had studied him. News reports. Military biography. The hallway video.
Grant expected him to behave like the angry father everyone had seen.
Daniel lowered his voice.
“You’re right.”
Karen stared at him.
“I know people,” Daniel continued. “I can get you time. But I need proof you have the card.”
Grant hesitated. “I’ll send a picture.”
“Send it from Lily’s phone.”
A notification appeared seconds later. The image showed a tiny black memory card resting on a sheet of weathered copper.
Behind it, out of focus, was a carved wooden edge.
Daniel knew the chapel roof was copper. The bell tower contained wooden maintenance stairs.
Grant was above the chapel ceiling.
Soto texted Karen: KEEP HIM TALKING. UNITS MOVING.
Daniel asked, “Why take Lily’s phone if all you needed was the card?”
“I thought she’d copied everything there.”
“Why not destroy it?”
“I needed to know who she sent files to.”
“So you read her messages.”
“Yes.”
“You knew she had told Tessa.”
“She hadn’t sent Tessa the important files.”
“You knew she’d contacted her mother.”
Grant said nothing.
Daniel’s stomach tightened.
He had read Karen’s number from Lily’s contacts. He might have listened to voicemail, read family messages, studied them all.
“What did you do with the phone after the attack?” Daniel asked.
“Kept it off.”
“Where was it while police searched your house?”
“Not there.”
“Where?”
Grant laughed softly. “You’re not as subtle as you think.”
Daniel heard the chapel bell mechanism engage. A click, then the heavy movement of gears.
The quarter hour struck.
Closer now.
Grant was inside the bell chamber.
“You called because you’re trapped,” Daniel said.
“I called because I’m negotiating.”
“The campus is surrounded.”
“I have a way out.”
“Then you wouldn’t need me.”
Grant’s breathing changed.
Daniel continued. “You left your car at the airport to make police think you flew. You lost the second car in mud. Jonah escaped. The drive is with police. Voss will blame you. Vale will blame you. Rusk already did. You’re standing in a freezing tower with a memory card you can’t open.”
“Shut up.”
“You don’t have a plan.”
“I said shut up.”
“You have Lily’s phone because it is the last thing you control.”
Grant shouted, “Give me the passcode!”
May you like
Lily flinched.
Daniel’s anger rose so fast that the hallway narrowed. He imagined Grant’s hand around the flashlight. He imagined Lily on the tile, lifting her arms while Rusk watched.
