Chapter 7 - The Brother She Never Mentioned
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Daniel sat in his car with the heater blasting, staring at the burner phone in his lap. He needed answers, and he couldn't trust the police. If this was a professional cartel or loan shark operation, going to the cops might get Emma and the baby killed.
He drove straight to his private office downtown. The building was empty, the security guard nodding sleepily as Daniel swiped his access card. He booted up his desktop computer and bypassed the company firewall to access a private background-check database his firm used for high-level executives.
He typed in Emma’s maiden name: Emma Hayes.
He had always known Emma was an orphan. She had told him her parents died in a car crash when she was a teenager, and she had grown up in the foster system. It was one of the reasons she was so fiercely compassionate toward those who were alone.
But as the search results populated on the screen, a glaring inconsistency appeared. Emma’s mother had died in a crash, yes. But her father hadn't. Her father had gone to federal prison for embezzlement. And more shockingly, Emma had a half-brother.
Elias Thorne.
Daniel clicked on Elias’s profile. A military photograph stared back at him. Elias was an ex-Marine who had been dishonorably discharged five years ago after being implicated in a black-market weapons ring. Since then, his record was a mess of petty crimes, unpaid debts, and suspected gang affiliations.
Daniel stared at the face on the screen. He mentally superimposed the man’s features onto the hooded figure from the motel security camera. The height matched. The build matched. Elias had been the one driving Emma in the dark SUV. Emma hadn't been kidnapped by him; she had gone to him for help.
Why would his sweet, charitable wife turn to a criminal half-brother instead of her own husband?
Because the threat came from Daniel’s world, not hers.
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Suddenly, Daniel’s desktop computer chirped. An incoming encrypted email flashed on the screen. The sender was anonymous. Daniel clicked it open, his heart pounding in his ears.
“Mr. Carter. Your wife’s brother tried to play the hero and took a bullet for his trouble. She is currently safe, but her blood pressure is rising. You have twenty-four hours to transfer the three million dollars from the Vanguard account, or we induce labor and keep the child as collateral.”
