Chapter 4 - Frank Carter's Secret
Frank wanted Eli outside before he spoke.
I agreed.
Marco took him and Goliath toward the rear porch.
The moment the door closed, Frank sat.
“My daughter was named Hannah.”
Eli's mother.
“She disappeared seven years ago.”
Eli had been two.
Everyone in Hollow Falls believed Hannah abandoned her child.
Frank never believed it.
“Why?”
“She loved that boy more than breathing.”
Police investigated.
Nothing.
Her car was found near Charleston.
No blood.
No body.
No useful surveillance.
Then Frank received an envelope.
Inside was a photograph of Hannah alive.
Beside her stood Silas Bennett.
“What was their relationship?”
Frank's jaw tightened.
“She worked for him.”
That surprised me.
Silas presented himself as a financial strategist from Connecticut.
Apparently twenty-five years earlier, he operated a private security network throughout Appalachia.
Smuggling.
Surveillance.
Debt collection.
And something Frank wouldn't explain.
“What?”
He looked ashamed.
“Children.”
Every muscle in my body tightened.
“Explain.”
“Not trafficking.”
Frank said it quickly.
“Records.”
Silas collected information about children connected to powerful families.
Birth certificates.
Custody files.
Adoptions.
He called it insurance.
A politician could ignore threats against himself.
Threats involving a hidden child were different.
“Hannah discovered the archive.”
Then she disappeared.
“And Eli?”
Frank looked toward the porch.
“His father died before he was born.”
“Name?”
“Daniel Carter.”
The hesitation was tiny.
But I saw it.
“That's a lie.”
Frank's face hardened.
“Leave the boy out of this.”
“He's already in it.”
I placed the October photograph on the table.
“Someone watched him months before he found me. I need to know why.”
Frank remained silent.
Then Marco entered.
“Boss.”
He had found something inside the lodge's security system.
An unauthorized connection.
Someone accessed cameras here three months earlier.
Same period Eli was photographed.
The safe house wasn't secret.
Someone knew.
Then Marco showed me the account used.
Bennett Strategic Holdings.
Silas.
He had prepared this location before my attempted murder.
Meaning he expected me to bring someone here.
Maybe Eli.
Maybe Frank.
Maybe both.
The entire rescue was beginning to feel less accidental.
I hated that thought.
No nine-year-old boy could fake finding a dying man in a blizzard.
But someone could arrange where the dying man was buried.
Near Eli's home.
Near Goliath's usual forest route.
“Frank.”
He closed his eyes.
“Daniel Carter wasn't Eli's father.”
There it was.
“Who was?”
“I don't know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“Hannah refused to tell me.”
But she had left one thing.
A letter.
For Eli when he turned eighteen.
Frank had hidden it inside his house.
“Get it.”
“We can't go back.”
“Marco will.”
Frank shook his head.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because somebody already searched my house.”
He had noticed before coming to the hospital.
Drawers disturbed.
Floorboards lifted.
Nothing obviously stolen.
They were looking for the letter.
Then Eli came inside.
Goliath followed carrying something in his mouth.
A leather wallet.
Marco took it.
Not ours.
Inside was identification.
Silas Bennett.
Frank stood so quickly his chair scraped backward.
“Where did you get that?”
Eli pointed outside.
“By the trees.”
We ran.
Footprints led away from the lodge.
Fresh.
Silas had been there minutes earlier.
Watching us.
Then Marco opened the wallet.
Inside wasn't money.
It contained a small photograph.
Hannah Carter holding newborn Eli.
Beside her stood a man whose face had been partially torn away.
But his left hand remained visible.
A distinctive black ring.
I stared at it.
I owned the same ring.
Every Moretti son received one at twenty-one.
Frank looked from the photograph to my hand.
Then whispered:
“Oh God.”
May you like
Eli's father wasn't some unknown man.
He was a Moretti.
