Chapter 10 - THE MAN WITHOUT THE CHAIR
Elias woke on a concrete floor.
His hands were bound behind his back. His legs lay twisted beneath him, sending fire through his damaged hip.
Rusk sat nearby.
“You look different without the chair.”
Elias forced his breathing to remain steady.
“So do you without armed men.”
Four guards stood behind Rusk.
Rusk smiled.
“The newspapers said paralysis humbled you.”
“The newspapers said you donated money to children.”
“I do.”
“You also kidnap mothers.”
“Complexity is what separates men from headlines.”
Rusk crouched.
“Isabella’s recording.”
“You already had Clara’s mother. You should have searched more carefully.”
“We found the device. It was corrupted.”
“Tragic.”
Rusk struck Elias across the face.
His head hit the floor.
Pain flashed white.
Rusk grabbed his hair.
“You spent fourteen months pretending disability made you untouchable.”
“No.”
Blood filled Elias’s mouth.
“I spent fourteen months learning which men enjoyed seeing me unable to stand.”
Rusk released him.
“And what did you learn?”
“That they always come too close.”
Elias drove his forehead into Rusk’s face.
Bone cracked.
Rusk fell backward.
Guards kicked Elias until the room blurred.
When he regained awareness, he was chained to a support column.
Rusk’s nose had been bandaged.
“You’ll unlock the ledger.”
“No.”
“Then Clara dies.”
Elias looked up.
“You don’t have her.”
“I will.”
“That is the difference between us.”
“What?”
“You keep believing people are possessions.”
Rusk’s expression darkened.
“She will come for you.”
“No.”
But Elias knew she would.
That terrified him more than death.
At Saint Jude, Clara knelt beside the overturned wheelchair.
One wheel continued spinning.
Gabriel shouted orders as his men searched the docks.
Thomas helped Anne into a vehicle.
Isabella stood in the rain, staring at the empty floor.
“This was the plan,” Clara said.
Gabriel turned.
“What?”
“Rusk never wanted the exchange to succeed. He wanted Elias outside the estate and separated from the chair.”
“We know.”
“No. We’re still thinking he kidnapped Elias to open the ledger.”
“Why else?”
“Revenge.”
Thomas approached.
“Rusk can’t unlock the server without Isabella’s live voice and Elias’s fingerprint.”
“He can force them.”
“Isabella is here.”
Clara looked toward the blood near the loading bay.
“Then he doesn’t need the ledger tonight.”
She closed her eyes, remembering Rusk’s words on the Mercy Ann.
People always die.
“He wants Elias to confess something.”
Gabriel went still.
“To what?”
Isabella answered.
“Killing Victor Sloane.”
Rusk’s former boss had disappeared two years earlier. Most assumed he had fled overseas.
Isabella’s face revealed another truth.
“He didn’t flee,” Clara said.
“No.”
“Elias killed him?”
“He ordered it,” Gabriel replied. “Sloane arranged the ambush. We believed he did.”
“But Rusk knows someone else paid for it.”
Isabella looked toward the dark water.
“Victor was Rusk’s father.”
Silence followed.
“We find Elias,” Clara said.
Gabriel looked at the docks.
“The boat vanished without lights.”
Anne made a sound from the vehicle.
Clara hurried to her.
Her mother held the old photograph.
With effort, Anne tapped the clock tower visible behind Thomas’s fishing boat.
“Nine forty wrong,” she repeated.
Thomas stared.
“What does she mean?”
Anne turned the photograph over.
Clara remembered the numbers hidden inside.
9-40-11-3-8.
They had assumed 9:40 referred to the grandfather clock.
What if it was also a location?
Thomas took out his phone and opened a maritime chart.
“Pier 9. Berth 40.”
“What about eleven, three, eight?” Gabriel asked.
“Navigation coordinates,” Isabella said. “Channel eleven, marker three, depth eight.”
Thomas traced the route.
“It leads to Gull Island.”
An abandoned naval communication station stood there.
Gabriel prepared a rescue team.
Clara climbed into the van.
“No,” he said.
“I’m coming.”
“You have no training.”
“I found the location.”
“That doesn’t make you bulletproof.”
Thomas touched Clara’s arm.
“Stay with your mother.”
Clara looked at him.
“You disappeared for fourteen months and think you can start giving orders?”
Pain crossed his face.
She immediately regretted the cruelty, but not the refusal.
“I’m going.”
Isabella handed Clara a small earpiece.
“Then listen carefully and do not improvise.”
Gabriel gave a humorless laugh.
“She sat on the floor beside a bleeding mafia boss instead of obeying him. Improvisation may be her defining trait.”
They reached Gull Island before dawn.
The old station contained three concrete buildings and a radio tower.
Thermal imaging showed five people inside the central structure.
Gabriel divided the team.
Clara entered through a drainage tunnel with Thomas. Isabella coordinated from the boat.
They found Elias’s wheelchair near the dock.
Rusk had brought it separately.
Clara touched the armrest.
A thin line had been scratched into the leather.
An arrow.
Elias had left a direction.
They followed it to the basement.
Through a vent, Clara saw him chained to a column. Blood covered his face. Rusk stood before a camera.
“Say it,” Rusk ordered.
Elias laughed weakly.
“Your father begged less elegantly.”
Rusk struck him.
The camera recorded everything.
Clara understood.
Rusk wanted a confession to Victor Sloane’s murder, then planned to kill Elias and release the footage.
Thomas placed a small explosive on the service door.
Clara shook her head.
“The blast could hurt him.”
“We need an entrance.”
She looked at the ventilation duct.
“I have one.”
The duct was narrow enough for her.
Thomas objected, but she crawled inside before he could stop her.
She emerged behind stacked crates in the basement.
Rusk held a knife against Elias’s throat.
“Confess.”
Elias stared into the camera.
“My name is Elias Moretti.”
Clara’s heart seized.
“Two years ago, I ordered Victor Sloane brought to my office.”
Rusk leaned closer.
Elias continued.
“I offered him whiskey.”
“What are you doing?” Rusk asked.
“Telling the story.”
“Tell it correctly.”
Elias smiled through blood.
“He accepted the drink.”
Clara moved between crates.
“And then,” Elias said, “Gabriel arrested him.”
Rusk froze.
“Victor Sloane entered federal custody under another name. He is alive.”
“That’s a lie.”
“Ask your father.”
A monitor behind Rusk activated.
Isabella appeared on the screen.
Beside her sat an older man with oxygen tubes beneath his nose.
Victor Sloane.
Rusk stared.
His father looked into the camera.
“Anthony,” he said. “It’s over.”
Rusk’s face collapsed.
“You abandoned me.”
“I testified to save your life.”
“You gave Moretti everything.”
“I gave the government names. Elias protected your identity.”
Rusk turned toward Elias.
“You protected me?”
“I protected your children.”
Rusk’s hand shook.
Then he raised the knife.
Clara stepped from behind the crates.
“Stop.”
Rusk spun.
She held a pistol with both hands.
Elias’s eyes widened.
“Clara, leave.”
“No.”
“Not again.”
“Apparently I’m bad at it.”
Rusk grabbed Elias by the hair and placed the blade against his throat.
“You won’t shoot.”
Clara’s hands trembled.
“You’re right.”
She lowered the gun.
Rusk smiled.
Then she kicked the wheelchair.
It rolled across the floor and struck his knees.
Rusk lost balance.
Elias drove his shoulder into him.
Clara fired into the ceiling.
Gabriel’s team breached the doors.
Gunfire filled the basement.
Rusk escaped through a side passage.
Clara ran to Elias.
He was still chained.
She reached toward him, then stopped.
“Can I touch you?”
Despite the blood and pain, Elias laughed.
“Yes.”
She unlocked the chains.
When she tried to help him into the chair, his arms failed.
Humiliation flashed across his face.
Clara did not rush.
She sat beside him.
“We have time.”
“No, we don’t. Rusk escaped.”
“Gabriel will find him.”
“You trust Gabriel now?”
“I trust him to chase armed men.”
Elias looked at her.
“You came.”
“Of course.”
“I told myself you wouldn’t.”
“You lied.”
“Yes.”
She offered her arms.
“You decide.”
Elias closed his eyes.
Then he placed one arm around her shoulders.
Together, slowly, they transferred him into the chair.
His face rested near hers.
Neither moved away.
“You should be afraid of me,” he whispered.
“I am.”
“That has never stopped you.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Clara looked at his mouth.
“Because fear is useful when people admit they have it.”
His own words.
Something softened in his eyes.
He touched her cheek.
Then an explosion shook the island.
The ceiling cracked.
Gabriel shouted through the earpiece.
“Rusk reached the radio tower. He has the ledger server, and he’s initiated a broadcast.”
Elias looked toward the monitor.
Lists of judges, officers, businessmen, and criminals began appearing on the screen.
The Black Ledger was releasing itself to the world.
And beside every name was a countdown.
Ten minutes.
Thomas stared at the numbers.
“When that reaches zero, every dormant account empties.”
“Where does the money go?” Clara asked.
Elias read the destination code.
His face changed.
“To the man who paid for my shooting.”
A name appeared on the screen.
May you like
GABRIEL REED.
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