Chapter 19 - The Man Gideon Failed to Kill
Edward Vale was alive.
That was the problem with my new life.
Dead people had terrible follow-through.
The abandoned biomedical facility sat beside the Chicago River behind a row of warehouses nobody looked at twice.
Stellan wanted me to stay behind.
I told him no.
He argued.
I reminded him Fern’s identity, my mother’s records, my landlord, my apartment, my job, and my child’s medicine had all been used in this conspiracy.
He stopped arguing.
Progress.
Fern stayed with Rose and a medical team in a separate safe location.
I hated leaving her.
But I needed to see the man who had turned her breathing into a business strategy.
We entered through the basement.
Darius led.
Stellan stayed beside me.
No dramatic mafia army.
Just four people who trusted each other slightly more than the alternatives.
Inside the old lab, monitors were still running.
Rows of archived blood samples sat in refrigerated cabinets.
Thousands.
I felt sick.
“This is Northstar,” Mercer whispered.
“No,” Stellan said. “This is inventory.”
A voice came through the overhead speakers.
“Exactly.”
Edward Vale stepped onto the upper walkway.
He was in his seventies.
Thin.
Ordinary-looking.
That offended me.
Men who ruined lives should at least have the decency to look evil.
Grant Mercer stood beside him with a gun.
Gideon Cross sat in a wheelchair nearby.
Alive.
Edward looked at Stellan.
“You have your father’s talent for arriving after the important decision has already been made.”
Stellan raised his weapon.
“Let him go.”
Edward smiled.
“Which one?”
Darius shifted.
Grant aimed at him.
I looked at the cabinets.
“Why Fern?”
Edward turned toward me.
“Because Fern changed the mathematics.”
“What mathematics?”
“Succession. Voting control. Debt. A living heir made Cross Holdings harder to acquire.”
“So you created Ava’s death.”
“Yes.”
“You diluted her medicine.”
“Yes.”
My hands shook.
“Why not kill her?”
Stellan looked at me sharply.
Edward answered calmly.
“Because her living bloodline made the trust predictable. A dead child would have triggered a forensic audit. A sick child with a dead legal identity was useful.”
I had never hated anyone so quickly.
Stellan’s voice went low.
“You poisoned an infant for accounting convenience.”
Edward shrugged.
“Your family has done worse for less.”
That was the villain’s best weapon.
Not a lie.
A true thing used as an excuse.
Gideon made a rough sound from the wheelchair.
Edward glanced at him.
“Your father understands.”
Stellan said, “My father is not my defense.”
Edward’s smile faded.
Good.
Grant moved suddenly.
Darius fired.
The lab erupted.
Glass shattered.
I dropped behind a steel table.
Stellan crossed the room under fire and pulled Gideon’s wheelchair behind cover.
Mercer shouted his son’s name.
Grant hesitated.
That hesitation saved Darius.
It also exposed Grant.
Stellan disarmed him and drove him to the floor.
Edward ran for the rear door.
I saw him before anyone else.
I grabbed the emergency freezer lever and pulled.
A steel security door dropped across the exit.
Edward slammed into it.
He turned and stared at me.
“You.”
I stood slowly.
“Me.”
Stellan almost smiled despite the blood on his face.
Police and federal agents entered minutes later, summoned by Roman’s dead-man file.
Edward was arrested.
Grant survived.
Gideon survived.
Northstar’s servers were seized.
For the first time, it looked like the nightmare had an ending.
Then an agent opened a sealed personnel file from Edward’s private terminal.
He looked at me.
“Ms. Hart?”
“What?”
“There’s one Northstar partner account we can’t identify.”
He turned the screen.
The account had been active for five years.
Its internal codename was LEDGER.
The same name Stellan’s family had used for my mother.
And the last login had occurred that morning.
From Rose Hart’s safe house.
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