Chapter 16 - THE CALL
For the first time since Nathan found her in the kitchen, Grace looked guilty.
Not afraid.
Guilty.
Back at the ranch, Lily slept upstairs while Grace sat across from Nathan at the dining table.
“I didn’t call Charles,” she said.
“Then who did?”
“My mother.”
Nathan stared.
Grace explained that five years earlier she had panicked after learning she was pregnant. Her mother, Evelyn, had believed Nathan would reject her and that the Cole family would destroy them both.
“So she called my father?”
“She thought she could negotiate protection.”
“What she did was give him a weapon.”
“I know.”
Grace’s eyes filled. “She regretted it for the rest of her life.”
Nathan stood and walked to the window.
“Is she alive?”
Grace nodded.
“Where?”
“New Mexico.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because after everything, she was the one person Lily had besides me.”
Nathan turned back.
He wanted to be angry. He was angry. But beneath it was exhaustion.
“Does she know where we are now?”
“No.”
Owen entered.
“Victoria’s in custody. Malcolm Dane is missing.”
Rebecca followed him with another file.
“And we found why.”
Federal agents had traced a private jet chartered by a Dane shell company.
Destination: Santa Fe.
Grace stood so fast her chair fell over.
“My mother.”
Nathan was already reaching for his keys.
They called New Mexico police on the way.
Officers reached Evelyn’s house first.
The front door was open.
No one was inside.
On the kitchen table sat a cup of tea still warm.
Beside it was an old photograph of Grace as a teenager.
And under the photograph, a handwritten note.
BRING THE GIRL, OR THE OLD WOMAN DISAPPEARS FOR GOOD.
Grace began to shake.
Nathan took the note from her.
At the bottom was a meeting place.
An abandoned mineral plant outside Gallup.
May you like
And a deadline.
Midnight.
