Chapter 4 - Unholy Alliances
We couldn't go back to our house. It was likely compromised. Instead, I drove to the one place I knew might be safe—a secluded cabin in the woods near Lake Norman, owned by my estranged brother, Marcus. Marcus was a former military intelligence officer who had gone off the grid after a bitter discharge. We hadn't spoken since Tessa's funeral, where he had warned me that "something about her crash didn't smell right." I had been too drowned in grief to listen to him then.
When we pulled into the gravel driveway of the cabin, Marcus met us at the door with a shotgun in his hands. But when he saw my shattered rear windshield, and then saw the disheveled, hollow-eyed woman stepping out of the front seat, his weapon slowly lowered.
"Jesus Christ, Ethan," Marcus breathed, staring at Tessa. "I told you. I told you she wasn't a statistic."
Inside the cabin, after Tessa washed the grime of the streets from her face and wore a pair of Marcus’s oversized sweatpants, we sat around a wooden table. Marcus provided hot soup for Miles, who promptly fell asleep on the couch, utterly exhausted by the emotional rollercoaster.
"Vanguard Group isn't just a pharmaceutical giant," Marcus explained, tossing a thick folder onto the table. "They are a massive defense contractor with deep ties to politicians and intelligence agencies. Arthur Vance is ex-CIA. He handles their black-budget problems. If they know Tessa is alive, they will lock down the city."
"We can't just run forever," I said, my fists clenching. "They stole three years of our lives. They tortured my wife. They made my son grow up an orphan. I want to tear them down."
Tessa looked up, fear warring with a sudden spark of her old, fierce self. "The flash drive. I hid it before they captured me. I knew they were watching my office, so I didn't keep it there. I hid it in the one place they would never think to look because they don't understand human sentiment."
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"Where, Tessa?" I asked.
"In the hollow base of the angel tombstone at my own fake grave," she said grimly.
