Chapter 13 - MIDNIGHT AT THE WATERFRONT
Gabriel returned to the rectory twelve minutes after Derek took Noah.
He came through the door with Elias, two guards, and fury so controlled it seemed to lower the temperature of the room.
Harper was standing beside the kitchen table with Noah's drawing in one hand.
Gabriel saw the open courtyard door.
Then he saw her face.
"Where is he?"
Harper could barely force the words out.
"Derek took him."
Gabriel stopped.
Elias moved immediately toward the rear hall.
"Guards?"
"One unconscious."
"The other missing."
Morrison added,
"The missing guard is Paul Mercer."
Elias swore.
"Malcolm recruited him."
Gabriel looked at Harper.
"How did Lawson know this location?"
She did not answer.
His eyes dropped to the prepaid phone on the table.
Understanding arrived slowly.
"You called him."
Harper lifted her chin.
"Yes."
Gabriel closed his eyes.
For one second, she expected an explosion.
Instead, he asked,
"Why?"
"Because I was trying to make him believe I would trade the evidence."
"Without telling me."
"You would have said no."
"Yes."
"Which is why I did not tell you."
Gabriel opened his eyes.
"And now Noah is gone."
The sentence struck exactly where Harper was already bleeding.
She went white.
Gabriel saw it.
Regret hit his face instantly.
"Harper, I did not mean-"
"Yes, you did."
"I meant the fact, not the blame."
"They feel identical right now."
She turned away.
"Save the apology."
Gabriel took one breath, then another.
When he spoke again, the anger had been forced into something useful.
"What did Lawson say?"
Harper told him everything.
The warehouse.
Midnight.
The recorder.
The microfilm.
Come alone.
Gabriel checked the time.
9:42 p.m.
"We have two hours."
"I am going."
"Yes."
Harper turned, surprised.
Gabriel held her gaze.
"I am not going to waste Noah's time fighting you about something you will do anyway."
"Good."
"That does not mean you go unprotected."
"Derek said alone."
"Lawson also promised to love and honor you."
Gabriel's voice was ice.
"We have established that his relationship with truth is flexible."
Harper looked at Elias.
"Can you track Noah's phone?"
"It was left here."
"Derek's?"
"Burner."
Elias shook his head.
"No location data."
Gabriel placed the scanned microfilm on a laptop.
"We give him what he expects."
"The real evidence?"
"No."
"He will know if it is fake."
"Then we do not fake it."
Gabriel removed the original black strip from a sealed evidence sleeve.
"We copy it perfectly and give him the original."
Harper stared at him.
"Why?"
"Because we already have the information."
"And the recorder?"
"Same."
"My mother's voice is on that."
Gabriel looked at her.
"Then you decide."
Harper hated the decision.
She hated that he was right to make it hers.
After a moment, she nodded.
"Give him the original."
Morrison looked at her.
"Are you sure?"
"No."
Harper swallowed.
"But Noah is alive."
"Objects are not."
Gabriel's expression softened.
"Good choice."
Harper shook her head.
"Do not grade me."
"Noted."
Elias prepared a transmitter small enough to hide inside the seam of Harper's coat.
She refused a weapon.
"If Derek finds it, he will use it as proof I came to attack him."
Gabriel frowned.
"You need something."
Harper lifted her keys.
"I survived him for three years without a gun."
"That is not the argument you think it is."
"It is the one I have."
They compromised on a ceramic emergency blade hidden inside her boot.
Before they left for the warehouse, Harper changed out of her torn sweater and stood alone in the rectory bathroom for one minute.
She looked at the woman in the mirror and tried to decide whether courage felt different from terror.
It did not.
Her hands still shook.
Her mouth was still dry.
Her body still wanted to hide.
The difference was that fear was no longer making the decision.
Gabriel knocked once on the open doorframe.
"We leave in ten."
Harper nodded.
He noticed her hands.
"You can still change your mind."
"No."
"I mean it."
"So do I."
Gabriel leaned against the frame.
"There is no version of this where I think sending you into that warehouse is a good idea."
Harper met his eyes in the mirror.
"Then why are you letting me?"
"Because Noah is your brother."
"Because Lawson knows you better than he knows any of us."
"And because you made the decision after hearing the risk."
Harper turned.
"That sounds almost healthy."
"Do not spread it around."
She smiled faintly.
Then Gabriel held out a small folded card.
It contained one sentence.
YOU DO NOT HAVE TO FINISH A PLAN JUST BECAUSE YOU STARTED IT.
Harper looked at him.
"What is this?"
"Something Simone said."
"You remembered?"
"Unfortunately, the lawyer says many useful things."
Harper slipped the card into her coat.
"If Derek changes the situation, I leave."
"Yes."
"If Noah is not there, I leave."
"Yes."
"If I say stop over the transmitter, everyone stops."
Gabriel hesitated only a fraction.
"Yes."
Harper heard the difficulty in that answer and respected him more for giving it anyway.
"Then we go."
Gabriel stepped aside.
For years, Derek had turned every doorway into a question of permission.
Harper walked through this one without asking.
At 11:31, Harper sat alone in a gray sedan one block from the warehouse.
Gabriel's vehicles remained out of sight beneath an overpass.
Elias spoke into her earpiece.
"We hear you."
Gabriel's voice followed.
"If you see Noah, you leave with him."
"That is the plan."
"If Lawson changes location, do not follow until we confirm coverage."
"Gabriel."
"What?"
"Stop talking."
A pause.
Then,
"Fine."
Harper almost smiled.
The warehouse smelled of salt, old fish, and machine oil.
One overhead light burned near the center of the floor.
Derek waited beneath it.
He wore a dark jacket and jeans.
No badge.
No visible weapon.
Harper knew better than to believe that meant anything.
"You came."
"Where is Noah?"
"Hello to you too."
"Where is he?"
Derek took a slow step closer.
Harper's body remembered him before her mind could intervene.
Her shoulders tightened.
Her breath shortened.
He noticed.
Of course he noticed.
His smile returned.
"Still scared of me."
Harper forced herself not to retreat.
"That is not the compliment you think it is."
The smile disappeared.
"You have been spending too much time with Ashford."
"I have been spending time away from you."
Derek's eyes hardened.
"Show me the evidence."
Harper held up the small envelope.
"Noah first."
"You do not make the rules."
"Then you do not get the envelope."
Derek moved so quickly that Harper's body screamed before he touched her.
He stopped inches away.
"Do you really believe Gabriel is going to keep you?"
Harper stared at him.
"Keep me?"
"Women like you always need someone."
"You hated that about me when we were married."
"I hated your weakness."
"No."
Harper surprised herself with how steady her voice sounded.
"You hated anything you could not own."
Derek's jaw tightened.
"Where is Noah?"
He circled her.
"You want the truth now?"
"For once."
"Fine."
He leaned close enough that she could smell peppermint gum.
"I never planned to marry you."
Harper's stomach twisted despite everything she already knew.
"I was supposed to get close, search Mara's house, find what she copied, and disappear."
"Who sent you?"
"Malcolm."
Gabriel heard the name through the transmitter.
Harper knew because her earpiece clicked once.
Derek continued.
"You made it complicated."
"By existing?"
"By trusting me."
For the first time, something like shame crossed his face.
It was gone immediately.
"You looked at me like I was better than I was."
Harper almost laughed.
"So you punished me for it."
"I tried to keep control."
"You broke my ribs."
"You fought everything."
"I breathed wrong."
Derek's face hardened.
"You do not get to rewrite our marriage because you found a rich protector."
Harper felt the old terror rise.
This time she let it rise and did not mistake it for obedience.
"I do not need Gabriel to tell me what happened in my own house."
Derek stepped closer.
"You need him for everything else."
"Where is Noah?"
"Safe."
"That word means nothing when you say it."
A metal door opened somewhere above them.
Footsteps sounded on a catwalk.
Harper looked up.
Adrian Vale appeared behind the railing.
He was in his late fifties, silver-haired, elegant, and carrying no visible weapon.
Morrison's brother.
Thomas's uncle.
Gabriel's enemy.
"Derek," Adrian called.
Derek looked irritated rather than surprised.
"You are early."
Adrian smiled.
"And you are predictable."
Harper's pulse climbed.
"Where is my brother?"
Adrian looked down at her.
"Alive."
"Prove it."
He nodded toward a side door.
Paul Mercer pushed Noah into view.
His hands were tied in front of him.
Harper's knees weakened.
"Harper!"
"I am here."
She took one step toward him.
Derek caught her arm.
Harper froze.
Gabriel's voice came faintly through the earpiece.
"Wait."
Derek leaned toward Harper's ear.
"Give me the envelope."
"Untie him."
"Envelope."
"Noah first."
Adrian laughed from the catwalk.
"I see why you could not control her."
Derek's fingers tightened painfully around Harper's arm.
She looked at him.
"He is laughing at you."
Derek's face changed.
Harper had learned his pride better than anyone.
"He thinks you are a dog."
"Shut up."
"Malcolm thinks so too."
"Shut up."
"They paid you to clean up Thomas and then spent seven years making you carry the risk."
Derek shoved her away.
"You know nothing."
Adrian's amusement vanished.
"Derek."
Harper saw it.
A crack between them.
She pushed.
"How much did they pay you?"
"Four hundred thousand?"
"Was that the price of Thomas's blood?"
Derek turned on her.
"I did not shoot Thomas."
The warehouse went silent.
Harper held his gaze.
"Who did?"
Derek realized too late what he had admitted.
"Who shot him?"
Adrian's voice cut down from above.
"Enough."
Harper looked up.
"You know too."
Adrian's face went cold.
"Give him the evidence."
"Noah first."
Adrian nodded to Mercer.
Mercer cut Noah's wrists loose.
Harper held out her arms.
"Come here."
Noah ran.
Halfway across the warehouse, the lights went out.
Gunfire exploded from the catwalk.
Harper dropped to the floor.
"Noah!"
A small body slammed into her.
She wrapped herself around him.
Men shouted in the darkness.
Gabriel's team had entered.
Then someone grabbed Harper by the back of her coat.
She kicked wildly.
"Let go!"
A cloth covered her mouth.
The smell was chemical and sharp.
Harper fought harder.
Her fingers found Noah's sleeve.
May you like
Then lost it.
The last thing she heard before darkness took her was Gabriel shouting her name.
