Chapter 17 - THE MILL
The camera was hidden inside the smoke detector.
Hotel security had no record of anyone entering after Sarah checked in.
That meant someone had prepared the room before she arrived.
Pike was still moving through systems like a ghost.
At 4 p.m. the next day, Sarah entered the old Belmont Mill wearing a wire.
The ledger in her bag was a copy.
The original sat in a federal evidence vault.
“Pike?”
A man stepped from behind an old machine.
“You look calmer than Rebecca did.”
Sarah’s blood turned cold.
“You followed her.”
“She should’ve handed over the book.”
“You ran her off the road.”
Pike smiled without humor.
“Linda paid for a problem to disappear.”
Sarah kept him talking.
“And now she wants me gone too?”
Pike’s expression changed.
“Linda isn’t paying anymore.”
“Then who is?”
“I am.”
Sarah’s heart slammed.
Raymond Cole stepped onto the catwalk above them. He was supposed to be in custody.
Harris’s voice whispered through her earpiece.
Ray leaned over the railing.
“Linda was useful. Jason was desperate. Pike was cheap. But none of them understood what those properties were really worth.”
“You built the whole thing.”
“Finally.”
Then Pike looked toward him.
“You said she came alone.”
Ray’s smile disappeared.
A red laser dot appeared on Pike’s chest.
Pike fired toward the catwalk.
Sarah dropped behind a steel column.
Windows shattered as tactical teams entered.
Ray sprinted along the catwalk.
Sarah heard metal groan overhead.
Ray fell twelve feet onto a conveyor frame.
Pike reached a side exit.
Sarah sat on the dusty floor shaking.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Fair answer.”
Agents recovered Ray’s phone.
On it was a draft message to Linda.
SARAH DONE BY 4:30. PIKE NEXT.
Ray had planned to kill both of them.
At the bottom was Jason.
Scheduled: after closing.
Sarah looked at Harris.
“What closing?”
He showed her the date.
Friday.
May you like
The deadline on Jason’s debt.
And Sarah suddenly realized someone had still expected the forged deed to go through.
