Chapter 12 - THE DEVIL IN A BESPOKE SUIT
The air inside the kitchen felt thick, heavy with the smell of sweet strawberries and freshly baked shortcake sitting on the counter. Addie was standing by the sink, holding a tub of whipped cream, watching me with a puzzled expression.
"Mommy, why did you lock the door?" she asked, her voice small. "Is Detective Miller playing a game?"
"Just stay right there, sweetie," I said, trying to keep my voice flat, calm, and reassuring. "Mommy needs to listen for a second."
I pressed my ear against the wood of the heavy front door. Outside, the evening air had turned frigid, carrying the low, rumble of two men speaking in measured, dangerous tones.
"You're trespassing on private property, Sterling," Miller’s voice carried clearly across the porch. "And you have about five seconds before I put a round through your radiator and call the State Police."
"Put the sidearm away, Ross," Richard Sterling replied smoothly. His voice was like oil poured over broken glass—refined, upper-crust, completely unbothered by the gun pointed near his feet. "We both know the State Police in this county take twenty minutes to respond to a rural call. And we both know you don't want a scene in front of the little girl."
"If you step one foot closer to these stairs, you won't live to see the State Police arrive," Miller said.
I heard the dry click of a leather briefcase latch being popped open.
"I’m not here to threaten anyone, Detective," Sterling said softly. "I’m here to deliver a settlement offer. An final resolution on behalf of my clients."
"Vance is going to die in a cage," Miller sneered. "There is no settlement."
"Dr. Vance was an reckless fanatic who exceeded his mandate," Sterling said coldly. "Apex Bio-Tech had no knowledge of his... aggressive human trial methodologies regarding pediatric respiratory patients. However, Dr. Vance's private servers contained proprietary algorithms that belong exclusively to our research division. Algorithms that your client, Mrs. Clara Mercer, managed to copy onto an external drive before she burned his laboratory to the ground."
My heart stopped.
The drive.
Fourteen months ago, during the terrifying night I rescued Addie from the hidden basement of Vance’s suburban clinic, I had grabbed a small metallic flash drive from his desk, thinking it contained Addie’s medical history. I had handed it over to the prosecutors. Or at least... I thought I had.
"She gave everything to the District Attorney," Miller said.
"She gave the DA the patient files," Sterling corrected him, taking half a step closer to the porch rail. "She kept the red drive. The drive containing the raw chemical synthesis data for the pediatric serum. We know she has it, Ross. Her former husband’s safety deposit box in Chicago was opened three weeks ago under her power of attorney."
My hand flew to my chest, touching the small key hanging beneath my shirt on a thin silver chain.
My ex-husband, David, had died two years before the nightmare began. I had forgotten that he maintained a small storage box at First National Bank in downtown Chicago—a box I had only recently emptied while settling his final estate taxes. Among his old tax forms and watch collections, I had found a small, unmarked metallic drive wrapped in black electrical tape. I had thrown it into my purse, assuming it was an old backup of our family photos.
It wasn't family photos.
It was Vance’s master key.
"She doesn't know what's on that drive," Miller stated firmly.
"It doesn't matter what she knows," Sterling said. "What matters is what my clients are willing to pay for its return. Five million dollars, Ross. Transferred into an offshore trust account in the Cayman Islands, fully tax-cleared, held in Addie’s name. The child will never have to work a day in her life. She can have the finest medical care in the world for the rest of her days."
"And if she says no?" Miller asked, his tone dropping into a dangerous, terrifying silence.
Sterling closed his briefcase with a soft snap.
"If she says no," Sterling murmured, "the trial records regarding her own actions the night the clinic burned will be unsealed. We have video footage from the hallway cameras, Ross. Footage that was... withheld from the grand jury."
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Sterling leaned forward into the light.
"Footage showing Mrs. Mercer holding a flare to the chemical waste line while Dr. Vance was still unconscious inside the room. In the eyes of the law, Detective... that isn't self-defense. That's attempted capital murder."
