Chapter 5 - THE MAN WHO COULD WALK
Malcolm entered the clinic walking slowly but without a cane.
Caspian watched him like a stranger.
Daniel remained near the doorway.
Up close, Sloan saw it immediately.
Not perfect resemblance.
Something subtler.
The shape of his eyes.
The line of his jaw.
He looked like Evelyn Reed.
Daniel looked at Sloan first.
“I'm sorry I frightened you.”
“You followed me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Malcolm told me you had something my birth mother left behind.”
Sloan stared at Malcolm.
“I don't.”
Malcolm sighed.
“You do. You just don't know it.”
Caspian stepped between them.
“Start talking.”
Malcolm's gaze moved toward him.
“You always did inherit your father's patience.”
“Don't.”
A warning.
Malcolm nodded.
“Fair enough.”
Caspian tossed the silver bracelet onto Morrison's desk.
Daniel saw it.
His face changed.
“Where did you get that?”
“Your mother.”
Daniel looked at Caspian.
The brothers stared at each other for several seconds.
Then Daniel whispered, “So it's true.”
“Yes.”
Daniel picked up the bracelet.
His hands trembled.
Sloan watched Caspian notice.
Watched him almost reach toward his brother.
Almost.
“Why fake the stroke?” Caspian asked Malcolm.
“To become irrelevant.”
“Try again.”
Malcolm looked tired.
“For forty years I've been useful to dangerous people. Retirement isn't something men like me are granted. A sick old man attracts less attention.”
“Did you tell Daniel to follow Sloan?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Thomas Hale left something with his daughter.”
Sloan stepped forward.
“My father never told me anything about your family.”
“Not deliberately.”
Malcolm pointed toward her necklace.
“May I?”
Sloan instinctively covered it.
“No.”
His eyes softened.
“Your grandmother's necklace wasn't your grandmother's.”
Sloan froze.
“My father gave it to me after she died.”
“Exactly.”
She slowly removed the chain.
The pendant was small, oval, silver.
She had worn it for fifteen years.
Malcolm said, “Open the back.”
“It doesn't open.”
“It does.”
Caspian took it only after Sloan nodded.
He pressed his thumbnail along the edge.
A tiny panel released.
Inside was a folded strip of paper.
Sloan's knees weakened.
Caspian unfolded it.
Three names.
Three dates.
And beneath them, a bank box number.
Malcolm exhaled.
“Thomas kept it.”
“What is this?” Sloan asked.
“Insurance.”
“Against whom?”
Malcolm looked at Caspian.
“Your father.”
Caspian's expression hardened.
“My father has been dead twenty-five years.”
“Yes.”
“But his money isn't.”
The room went quiet.
Malcolm explained.
Caspian's father had hidden millions through legitimate businesses using identities belonging to hospital patients, employees, even children.
Julian's identity had been one of them.
When Evelyn discovered it, she realized her infant son could someday be blamed for crimes committed before he could walk.
Thomas Hale helped her hide Julian.
But he also copied records proving what had happened.
“Those names,” Malcolm said, pointing toward the paper, “are the three people who knew where the original records were stored.”
Sloan read them.
Evelyn Reed.
Thomas Hale.
Arthur Morrison.
All but Morrison were dead.
“So what's in the bank box?”
“I don't know,” Morrison said.
Malcolm looked at him sharply.
“You told me Thomas emptied it.”
“I thought he had.”
Sloan suddenly remembered something.
Her father's old watch.
A scratched brass watch he never wore but refused to throw away.
After his death, Sloan kept it in a box.
It was in Boston.
In the apartment she'd abandoned.
Caspian saw her expression.
“What?”
“My father's watch.”
Malcolm went still.
“What about it?”
“He once told me never to sell it because it was worth more than it looked.”
Malcolm's face changed.
Not greed.
Fear.
Caspian noticed too.
“What is inside the watch?”
Malcolm shook his head.
“I don't know.”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“You know everything until suddenly you don't.”
Malcolm looked at him.
“I was trying to protect you.”
“By lying to me for thirty years?”
“Your mother asked me to.”
“And now?”
“Now people connected to your father's old organization have started asking about financial records that should have disappeared decades ago.”
Caspian's eyes narrowed.
“Who?”
Malcolm didn't answer.
Daniel did.
“Elias.”
Everyone turned.
Elias stood near the door.
His face remained calm.
Caspian's voice became very quiet.
“What did you say?”
Daniel looked at Elias.
“He contacted Malcolm before I did.”
Elias shook his head.
“That's a lie.”
Daniel reached into his pocket.
Caspian's men moved instantly.
“Phone,” Daniel said.
Nothing more.
He placed it on the desk.
A photograph showed Elias meeting Malcolm at a Boston restaurant four months earlier.
Caspian looked at his most trusted security chief.
“You told me you hadn't seen Malcolm since Christmas.”
Elias said nothing.
Caspian stepped closer.
“Why did you lie?”
Elias looked toward Sloan.
Then her stomach.
“Because the first threat wasn't against you.”
He reached slowly into his jacket and removed a folded hospital printout.
Sloan recognized the logo.
Her Boston emergency department.
Her name was at the top.
Below it was a lab result dated six months earlier.
Positive pregnancy test.
Sloan stared.
“I never took a hospital pregnancy test.”
Elias looked at her.
“No.”
Then he turned toward Caspian.
May you like
“Someone created one before Sloan even knew she was pregnant.”
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