Chapter 3 - WHAT HAPPENED AT THE RED DOOR
Emma stood beneath the parking garage lights, staring at her brothers.
“What promise?”
Jack looked at Noah.
Noah looked at Luke.
None of them wanted to answer.
Emma's voice became firmer.
“What happened?”
Jack sighed.
“Mom wasn't supposed to die the way you were told.”
Emma felt the ground disappear beneath her.
“What are you saying?”
“She didn't die peacefully in her sleep.”
Noah stepped closer.
“She was investigating Daniel.”
Emma's mouth opened.
“No.”
Luke shook his head.
“Not Daniel at first.”
“Then who?”
“Mercer Holdings.”
Emma stared at them.
Her mother's death had been explained as a sudden stroke.
She had been forty-nine.
Healthy.
Active.
One afternoon, she collapsed in her kitchen.
That was the story Emma had lived with for nine years.
Jack continued.
“Three days before she died, Mom called me.”
“What did she say?”
“She said she'd found something in Daniel's company.”
Emma's face tightened.
“Daniel wasn't CEO then.”
“No.”
“He was still working there.”
“Exactly.”
Noah opened the file.
“Your mother had discovered unusual transfers between Mercer Holdings and three private companies.”
“Why would she investigate Daniel's company?”
“She was helping one of the company's employees.”
“Who?”
Noah pulled out an old photograph.
A man in his fifties stood beside a loading dock.
Emma recognized him.
“Mr. Bennett.”
Her mother's old accountant.
“He disappeared.”
“No,” Noah said.
“He was fired.”
Luke added quietly, “And then he vanished.”
Emma remembered.
Her mother had once mentioned a man named Thomas Bennett.
She had never explained who he was.
Jack continued.
“Mom believed Bennett had evidence that someone was moving money out of Mercer Holdings.”
Emma looked at the photograph.
“Daniel?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
Noah turned the page.
The name was circled.
Richard Bell.
Emma stared.
“Daniel's lawyer?”
“Yes.”
Her brothers had been investigating him for years.
Richard had represented Daniel during Mercer Holdings' expansion.
He had also represented several shell companies receiving payments from Mercer.
Emma felt sick.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
Jack's voice softened.
“Because Mom made us promise.”
“She knew she was in danger?”
“Yes.”
Emma looked at the photograph again.
“And the red door?”
Luke answered.
“The night before Mom died, she told us to meet her at a warehouse.”
“What warehouse?”
“An old Mercer property.”
Noah's voice was quiet.
“There was a red steel door at the back.”
Jack continued.
“We got there late.”
“How late?”
“About twenty minutes.”
“What happened?”
“The warehouse was empty.”
Emma frowned.
“And?”
“We heard someone inside.”
Jack looked down.
“We opened the red door.”
Emma waited.
“There was a man lying on the floor.”
“Who?”
“Thomas Bennett.”
Emma covered her mouth.
“He was alive.”
“He told us Mom was in danger.”
“Where was she?”
“Gone.”
Jack's voice cracked.
“We found her car outside.”
Emma stared at him.
“What did you do?”
“We called the police.”
“And?”
“They said she had already gone home.”
Emma's eyes filled.
“You let her go home?”
“We didn't know.”
Jack swallowed.
“We thought she had left before we arrived.”
Noah added, “The next morning she was dead.”
Silence filled the garage.
Emma sat on the hood of the sedan.
“So you knew.”
“Yes.”
“And you never told me.”
“We were trying to protect you.”
Emma looked at Jack.
“You don't get to use that sentence.”
Jack lowered his head.
“I know.”
Luke opened his laptop.
“There's another problem.”
He showed Emma a transaction record.
The warehouse had been purchased through a company created eleven years ago.
The owner was listed as E.H. Hayes.
Emma stared.
“My mother.”
“Yes.”
“But Mom never owned that company.”
“No.”
Luke enlarged the document.
The signature was almost identical to hers.
Almost.
Noah studied it.
“Forgery.”
Emma whispered, “Who forged it?”
Luke clicked another file.
A bank transfer appeared.
The funds came from Mercer Holdings.
The authorization came from Daniel.
Emma looked up.
“So Daniel knew about the warehouse.”
“Yes.”
“Did he know Mom was investigating?”
“We don't know.”
A message appeared on Luke's laptop.
He frowned.
“What?”
“The account just went active.”
Emma stepped closer.
“Which account?”
“The old warehouse account.”
“Someone is accessing it right now.”
Noah looked at the timestamp.
“Can you trace it?”
Luke nodded.
“I'm trying.”
His fingers moved quickly.
Then he stopped.
The screen displayed a location.
Emma stared.
“That's impossible.”
“What?”
“That address.”
She pointed.
“It’s Daniel's private office.”
Jack's face hardened.
Luke checked again.
“No mistake.”
Emma's phone vibrated.
A text appeared from an unknown number.
You wanted the red door.
A second message followed.
Now open it.
Then a third.
But don't bring Daniel.
Emma looked at her brothers.
Jack was already reaching for his coat.
Noah closed the file.
Luke shut his laptop.
Emma stood.
“Let's go.”
Jack stopped her.
“Emma.”
She looked at him.
“If someone has been hiding this from us for nine years, we don't know what we're walking into.”
Emma held up the photograph of her mother.
“Neither did she.”
Then she turned toward the car.
And Noah noticed something written beneath the photograph's date.
May you like
A tiny set of initials.
D.M.
