Chapter 4 - The Secrets of the Estate
By midnight, we were tucked away inside a secure, off-the-grid safehouse in Key West, Florida.
The room smelled of gun oil, fresh coffee, and ocean salt. Guns, monitors, and encrypted satellite rigs lined the wooden tables.
My former squad—Marcus Vance, Corporal Elena Vasquez, and Sergeant Doc Miller—were working tirelessly, decrypting the hard drives retrieved from Harrison Sr.’s briefcase.
David and his father were currently being held in separate holding rooms at the Monroe County Sheriff's Office under federal warrants obtained through Marcus's high-level military intelligence contacts.
"Sarah," Elena called out from her computer monitor, gesturing for me to come over. "You need to see this."
I walked over, holding a cup of black coffee. "What did you crack?"
"The encrypted drive from Harrison Sr.’s briefcase doesn't just contain financial ledgers," Elena revealed, her expression darkening with disgust. "It contains personal surveillance files spanning thirty years."
She clicked on a file folder labeled EVELYN DAVIS – 1998.
My heart stopped.
Evelyn Davis was David’s mother. According to the public narrative spun by the Davis family for over two decades, Evelyn had died in a tragic car accident in France when David was eight years old.
Elena played an audio recording saved inside the folder dated June 14, 1998.
A woman’s terrified voice rang through the speakers, choked with sobs:
"Please, Harrison! Don't do this! I won't say anything about the offshore accounts! Just let me take David and leave!"
A harsh slaps echoed, followed by Harrison Sr.’s cold, cruel voice:
"You aren't going anywhere, Evelyn. A Davis wife stays until I say she leaves. If you try to run, I'll make sure you spend the rest of your life locked in a mental institution under a false name."
The recording cut out.
Tears pricked the corners of my eyes as the horrifying truth washed over me.
"She didn't die in France, did she?" I whispered.
"No," Elena said, pulling up a recent medical file from a private, heavily guarded psychiatric facility in upstate New York called St. Jude’s Sanatorium. "Harrison Sr. used his wealth and bribed doctors to declare his wife legally insane twenty-six years ago. He locked her away under the alias 'Evelyn Miller' so he could seize her inheritance and control the family narrative."
I slammed my fist onto the desk, rattling the coffee cups.
David had grown up watching his father abuse, silence, and erase his mother. He had been molded into a replica of his father—a cowardly monster who believed women were objects to be controlled, beaten, or discarded for profit.
"Where is she right now?" I demanded, looking Marcus straight in the eye.
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"She’s still inside St. Jude’s Sanatorium," Marcus replied, pulling a set of tactical blueprints onto the table. "The facility is owned by a subsidiary of Davis Enterprises. It’s guarded by private security twenty-four hours a day."
"Then we're going to New York," I said, pulling my combat dress boots back on and tightening the laces. "We're going to rescue David’s mother, and we're going to give her her life back."
