Chapter 7
Ethan spent the next week gathering information.
Marcus came through with documents. Financial records. Meeting minutes. Emails between Margaret and Hale.
The picture that emerged was worse than Ethan had imagined.
Margaret had begun planning her takeover months before the plane crash. She had quietly bought shares from minor stockholders. She had cultivated relationships with board members. She had positioned herself to take control the moment Ethan was out of the picture.
And Hale?
Hale had provided the money. The connections. The muscle.
The merger documents showed that Hale would own fifty-one percent of the combined company. Margaret would get a seat on the board and a golden parachute worth hundreds of millions.
Vanessa would get a senior executive position and enough money to live comfortably for the rest of her life.
They had all benefited from Ethan's “death.”
And then there was the plane crash.
Marcus had found a witness—a private pilot who had been in the air that day. He had seen something. A flash of light. A small object falling from the sky just before the plane exploded.
The official investigation had dismissed it as a reflection from another aircraft.
But the pilot had stuck to his story.
And Marcus had found something else.
Maintenance records for the plane.
The aircraft had undergone a routine inspection three days before the crash. Everything had been in perfect working order.
Engine failure, the official report had said.
But an engine that had passed inspection three days earlier doesn't just fail.
Not catastrophically.
Not without warning.
Ethan sat in the motel room, staring at the documents spread across the bed.
They had tried to kill him.
His own mother.
The woman who had given birth to him. Who had raised him. Who had pretended to grieve for him.
She had tried to kill him.
And she had thrown his pregnant wife out on the street.
Ethan's hands trembled with rage.
He wanted to go to the police. Wanted to walk into the nearest station and tell them everything.
But he had no proof.
Not really.
Circumstantial evidence. Witness testimony that had already been dismissed once. Financial records that showed motive but not action.
It wasn't enough.
He needed more.
He needed to catch them in the act.
Ethan's phone buzzed. A text from Claire.
I miss you.
He smiled despite everything.
They had been meeting secretly. Late at night, after Daniel had gone home. Ethan would sneak up the back stairs of her apartment building. They would spend a few hours together, talking, holding each other, Ethan's hands resting on her belly as their sons moved inside her.
Then he would leave before dawn.
It wasn't enough.
But it was everything.
Ethan texted back.
I miss you too. I'll see you tonight.
He stood and began gathering the documents. He had a plan.
It was risky.
Dangerous.
But it was the only way.
May you like
He was going back to Atlanta.
He was going to confront his mother.
