Chapter 7 - THE FIFTEEN-MINUTE ULTIMATUM
Every instinct in Kais screamed at him to get into a car and start driving.
Lena stopped him.
“If you go blind, you make this worse.”
“He has my daughter.”
“I heard him.”
“Then get out of my way.”
“No.”
She stepped between him and the garage.
“You think Cole gave us fifteen minutes because he wants that case?”
“Yes.”
“He wants you panicking.”
“He has Isa.”
“He wants you predictable.”
Kais stared at her.
The detective beside them spoke.
“She’s right.”
Kais turned on him.
“Do not tell me to be calm.”
“I’m not.”
Detective Marcus Bell had been working financial crime cases for seventeen years.
He looked at Kais with the steadiness of someone accustomed to wealthy men believing anger was a strategy.
“I’m telling you we’re going to use the fifteen minutes.”
Kais’s hands shook.
He hated it.
Not fear itself.
The helplessness of it.
“Track Rian’s phone.”
“We are.”
“The SUV?”
“Traffic cameras.”
“Cole?”
“Known vehicle tags are being circulated.”
Kais looked at the clock.
Fourteen minutes.
Lena opened the black case again.
“What does Julian actually need?”
“The drive.”
“No. What does he need from the drive?”
Kais stared at her.
“Evidence destroyed.”
“Exactly.”
She took out the hard drive.
Then handed the empty black case to Bell.
“You can put something else inside.”
Bell almost smiled.
“I like attorneys who think like criminals.”
“I bill by the hour.”
Kais did not react.
His phone rang.
Unknown number.
“Dad?”
Isa.
He nearly collapsed from relief.
“Isa.”
“I’m okay.”
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is Mommy with you?”
“Yes.”
Rian’s voice came faintly.
“Kais, don’t give them—”
The phone was taken.
Cole came on.
“Thirteen minutes.”
“Let them go.”
“Case first.”
“If Julian wants it, tell him to call me.”
Cole was silent.
That confirmed something.
Julian was nearby.
Kais continued.
“You’re taking all the risk for him.”
“Kais.”
“When this ends, he’ll say you acted alone.”
“Stop.”
“He did it to Aaron Cho. He’ll do it to you.”
“Ten minutes.”
The call ended.
Bell nodded.
“Good.”
“Good?”
“You got a reaction.”
Kais hated that his mind still worked even while terror was eating him alive.
“Cole knows he’s disposable.”
“Exactly.”
A detective approached.
“We found the vehicle.”
Everyone turned.
“Traffic camera caught it crossing toward Bellevue.”
“Where?”
“Westbound off the island, then north.”
“Toward Clyde Hill?”
“Possibly.”
Kais thought.
Julian owned properties everywhere.
Condominiums.
Warehouses.
Investment houses.
Then Isa’s voice returned to him.
Uncle Julian told me never to touch the wall.
Uncle Julian said I was going to live somewhere else.
“His father’s old guesthouse.”
Lena frowned.
“What?”
“Julian still owns the Bellevue lake house.”
Bell was already moving.
“Address?”
Kais gave it.
Police units were dispatched.
Eight minutes.
Kais carried the decoy case outside.
Rainwater hit his face.
“Front steps,” Cole had said.
Why?
If they were in Bellevue, why demand the case left here?
Because someone else would collect it.
The police positioned themselves inside.
Kais placed the case on the stone.
Then walked back into the house.
Seven minutes.
Nothing.
Six.
A delivery van approached slowly.
It stopped thirty yards away.
A hooded figure stepped out.
Not Cole.
A teenager.
Maybe nineteen.
He ran to the steps, grabbed the case, and turned.
Police moved immediately.
The teenager dropped it.
“Don’t shoot!”
He fell to his knees.
Within seconds he was restrained.
Bell crouched beside him.
“Who sent you?”
“I don’t know!”
“You were picking up a package.”
“Some guy paid me five hundred bucks.”
“Where were you supposed to take it?”
The teenager shook his head.
“Parking garage downtown.”
Kais’s phone rang.
Cole.
“You involved police.”
“You kidnapped a six-year-old child.”
“You just made this worse.”
In the background, Kais heard something.
A horn.
Then another.
Traffic.
Rian shouted.
“ISLAND CREST!”
The line went dead.
Kais spun toward Bell.
“Island Crest Way.”
Bell radioed units.
“They’re still on Mercer Island.”
The Bellevue route had been a decoy.
Two patrol cars reversed direction.
Kais was already in the Escalade.
Bell climbed into the passenger side before Kais could object.
They drove.
Fast.
Not recklessly.
Bell would not allow that.
Traffic was thick from the storm.
Then dispatch crackled.
“Possible black Range Rover northbound Island Crest.”
Kais gripped the wheel.
“Where?”
“Near 68th.”
A second voice.
“Vehicle turning east.”
Bell looked at him.
“Toward the marina.”
Kais knew the place.
An old private dock Hart Global had once used for client events.
His family still owned a boathouse there.
They reached the entrance.
Police cars blocked the access road.
A black Range Rover sat crooked near the water.
Empty.
Kais was out before Bell finished speaking.
“Stay behind us!”
Kais ignored him.
The boathouse door stood open.
Inside, Rian sat on the floor.
Her wrists bound with plastic ties.
Kais ran to her.
“Isa?”
“They took her down the dock.”
“Julian?”
Rian nodded.
“He was waiting.”
Kais cut her restraints with a detective’s blade.
“He has Isa?”
“He says he only wants the drive.”
Police moved toward the dock.
Rian grabbed Kais’s sleeve.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Marla was with him.”
He froze.
“Here?”
“She kept crying.”
Kais looked toward the rain.
A small motorboat floated at the end of the dock.
Julian stood inside it.
Isa beside him.
Marla near the wheel.
Kais’s heart stopped.
“ISA!”
She turned.
“Daddy!”
Julian held her shoulder.
Not violently.
But firmly enough.
Police raised weapons.
Julian shouted.
“Back off!”
Kais walked onto the dock.
Bell grabbed him.
“Kais.”
“He won’t hurt her.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes.”
Kais looked at his brother.
“He wants me to watch him win.”
Julian smiled faintly.
“Always so certain.”
Kais stopped twenty feet away.
“Let her go.”
“The drive.”
“I have it.”
Julian’s eyes sharpened.
“Show me.”
Kais reached into his jacket.
The real hard drive was not there.
Lena had it.
But Julian did not know that.
Kais held up a similar device Bell had supplied.
“Isa first.”
Julian shook his head.
“Throw it.”
“Send her toward me.”
“Throw it.”
“Julian.”
Their eyes met.
For a moment, they were not billionaires or executives.
They were boys again.
Two sons of a hard father.
One had spent his life trying to outrun expectations.
The other had spent his life counting every time he felt second.
“You scared a child,” Kais said.
Julian’s expression tightened.
“You destroyed Rian.”
“She had choices.”
“You starved them.”
“I needed the signature.”
“You needed to win.”
Julian’s eyes flashed.
“I needed what should have been mine.”
Isa was crying now.
Kais kept his voice steady.
“Isa, look at me.”
She did.
“Remember when we practiced swimming off the dock?”
She nodded.
“Remember what I told you?”
Julian frowned.
“Kais.”
“Don’t.”
Isa’s little body tensed.
Kais saw it.
So did Julian.
Too late.
Isa stomped hard on Julian’s foot.
Then dropped.
She slipped beneath his arm and jumped off the boat.
Into the water.
“ISA!”
Kais dove.
The lake swallowed him.
Cold shock seized his chest.
He opened his eyes underwater.
Darkness.
Bubbles.
Then lavender fabric.
He grabbed her.
Pulled her upward.
They broke the surface together.
Isa coughed.
Kais held her.
“I’ve got you.”
Above them, shouting erupted.
Marla screamed.
The boat engine roared.
Julian shoved away from the dock.
Police rushed forward.
Kais barely saw it.
He only saw Isa.
Alive.
Her arms around his neck.
“I knew you’d come,” she gasped.
His eyes burned.
“Every time.”
Bell and another officer pulled them from the water.
Rian ran to Isa.
Mother and daughter collapsed together.
The motorboat sped into the gray rain.
Julian had escaped.
But Marla had not.
She stood frozen on the dock.
She had jumped off the boat before it pulled away.
Hands raised.
Sobbing.
Bell approached her.
“Marla Quinn?”
She nodded.
“I’ll tell you everything.”
Kais looked up.
Marla stared at him.
“Julian killed your father.”
The dock went silent.
Kais slowly stood.
“What did you say?”
Her face crumpled.
“He didn’t mean to sink the boat.”
Rian covered Isa’s ears.
Marla continued.
“He only meant to disable the steering.”
Kais stared at her.
“Why?”
“He wanted your father frightened enough to reconsider the trust.”
Kais felt the world tilt.
Marla whispered, “There’s proof.”
“Where?”
She looked toward the lake where Julian had disappeared.
“On the silver drive.”
Kais frowned.
“What silver drive?”
Marla’s eyes widened.
“You don’t have it?”
“No.”
Fear entered her face.
“Then Julian still does.”
May you like
She looked at Bell.
“And if he reaches the airport with it, every account he stole from will disappear before sunrise.”
