Chapter 11 - The Flight North.
Grant refused to use a Hawthorne aircraft.
If Victor had spent months exploiting company systems, then every corporate jet, driver, and travel coordinator might as well have been broadcasting Grant’s location.
Rebecca arranged a charter under her firm’s name from a small regional airport.
Grant, Evelyn, Elias, and Rebecca boarded twenty-six minutes after leaving the estate.
Sebastian remained behind with Mara, Lucy, Bruno, and two security officers Elias had personally chosen.
Before Grant left, he pulled Sebastian aside in the foyer.
“If anything changes, you take Mara and Lucy through the old wine tunnel.”
Sebastian raised an eyebrow.
“You know about that?”
“Evelyn does.”
“Of course she does.”
Grant looked toward the staircase.
“You keep them safe.”
Sebastian’s expression lost its irritation.
“With my life.”
Grant studied him for a moment.
“That answer is not as reassuring as you think.”
Sebastian gave a tired smile.
“Then come home quickly.”
The charter climbed through low clouds while darkness spread beneath them.
Evelyn sat beside the window with her hands folded tightly in her lap.
Grant sat across from her.
They had been reunited for less than three hours and were already chasing the man who might have arranged her death.
No marriage counselor in America would have recommended the evening.
Rebecca worked beside Elias, comparing flight records and Portland property searches.
Grant watched Evelyn.
She noticed.
“What?”
“I am checking whether you disappear when I blink.”
Her expression softened.
“I am trying not to.”
“That is an improvement.”
She looked down.
Grant immediately regretted the edge in his voice.
He leaned forward.
“I do not know how to do this yet.”
“Neither do I.”
“I spent two months learning how to be a widower.”
“I spent two months learning how not to be found.”
Their eyes met.
Grant lowered his voice.
“Both skills appear useless now.”
A small smile touched her face.
For several minutes, neither spoke.
Then Evelyn said, “The night before the crash, I almost told you everything.”
Grant waited.
“You were asleep.”
“I would have preferred being awakened.”
“I know.”
“I also snore, apparently, so revenge would have been justified.”
Evelyn laughed softly.
The sound made Rebecca glance up, then politely return to her screen.
Evelyn’s smile faded.
“I stood beside the bed for ten minutes.”
“Why did you leave?”
“Because the messages from your number had started that afternoon.”
Grant looked at the floor.
“I hate that someone used me to frighten you.”
“That was the point.”
“To isolate you.”
“Yes.”
“And it worked.”
“For a while.”
Grant reached across the narrow aisle and took her hand.
This time she did not hesitate.
Elias interrupted quietly.
“Victor’s jet has landed.”
Grant released Evelyn’s hand.
“Where?”
“Portland International, not the private field we expected.”
Rebecca frowned.
“That is public.”
“Exactly.”
“Maybe he wants to be seen,” Evelyn said.
Elias nodded.
“He used his own name on the manifest.”
Grant leaned back.
“A man fleeing exposure does not make himself easier to track.”
“Unless he is not fleeing,” Rebecca said.
“Or unless someone wants us following him,” Evelyn added.
Grant looked at the map.
“Where is Eleanor?”
Rebecca had reached the Portland hotel manager.
Anna Reed had checked out the previous week.
The hotel retained a forwarding note for a local postal box but no address.
Elias searched public records and found three women named Anna Reed in the metro area.
None matched Eleanor’s age.
Grant stared at the screen.
“She has been hiding longer than any of us.”
Rebecca nodded.
“She will not be easy to find.”
Evelyn touched the thumb-and-pinky symbol on the anonymous note.
“Unless she wants to be found.”
The charter landed shortly after ten.
Rain coated the runway.
A rented SUV waited under Rebecca’s name.
Elias drove.
Grant sat beside him while Evelyn and Rebecca worked in the back.
They went first to the postal box.
The twenty-four-hour facility was nearly empty.
Rebecca showed identification and a copy of her earlier correspondence with Anna Reed.
The clerk refused to disclose customer information.
Grant respected that for nearly four minutes.
Then Evelyn noticed a handwritten flyer taped beside the counter.
A local animal rescue was seeking donations for a veterinary procedure.
At the bottom was a photograph of a black Great Dane.
Not Bruno.
But the sight made Evelyn pause.
“Eleanor had a dog when she was young,” Sebastian had mentioned during the flight by secure message.
A Great Dane named Archer.
Evelyn looked at the clerk.
“Does Anna Reed donate to that rescue?”
Rebecca stared at her.
The clerk’s expression gave away the answer before his words did.
“I cannot discuss customers.”
Evelyn smiled gently.
“We are not asking for her address.”
Grant understood.
“Just tell us the rescue name.”
The clerk pointed to the flyer.
“Rose Harbor Animal Trust.”
Twenty minutes later, they were driving toward a small property outside the city.
The rescue occupied an old farmhouse with three barns and a fenced field.
A woman in a raincoat met them beneath the porch light.
She looked at Rebecca and sighed.
“She told me you might come.”
Grant’s pulse increased.
“Eleanor?”
The woman did not answer.
“She said if a lawyer named Rebecca arrived with an arrogant man in an expensive coat, I should ask one question.”
Evelyn looked at Grant.
“Accurate so far.”
Grant ignored her.
“What question?”
The woman looked directly at him.
“What did Eleanor steal from Sebastian on her seventeenth birthday?”
Grant stared.
“I have no idea.”
Rebecca looked disappointed.
Then Evelyn smiled.
“His car.”
Everyone turned to her.
Sebastian had told the story once at Christmas after too much wine.
His younger sister stole his red convertible, drove it to Rhode Island, and returned it with a parking ticket and a live chicken in the passenger seat.
The family had laughed without realizing the unnamed sister in the story was Eleanor.
The woman in the raincoat nodded.
“Come inside.”
Eleanor Hawthorne was sitting at a kitchen table beneath a yellow lamp.
She had silver-blonde hair cut to her chin and the unmistakable Hawthorne eyes.
Grant saw his father in the shape of her brow.
He saw Sebastian in the way she held her shoulders.
He also saw fear.
Eleanor looked at Evelyn first.
“You are not dead.”
Evelyn gave a tired smile.
“Apparently not.”
Eleanor stood.
For a moment, neither woman knew whether to shake hands or embrace.
Eleanor chose the embrace.
Then she turned to Grant.
“You look like Thomas.”
Grant’s throat tightened.
“My father.”
“Yes.”
“He never told me about you.”
“I asked him not to.”
That surprised Grant.
Eleanor sat again.
“Thomas wanted to find me for years.”
“Why stop him?”
“Because our father had long arms and a longer memory.”
“The old man has been dead for twenty years.”
“Fear can outlive the person who taught it to you.”
Evelyn looked at Grant.
The sentence belonged to more than one person in the room.
Rebecca placed Claire Lang’s photograph on the table.
Eleanor’s face changed instantly.
Her hand went to her mouth.
“You know her,” Grant said.
Eleanor touched the photograph with one finger.
“Claire.”
“Your daughter?”
Tears filled Eleanor’s eyes.
“Yes.”
Grant felt the air leave the room.
Eleanor explained that Claire found her four years earlier.
The adoption records had been partially opened after Claire’s adoptive parents died.
She had learned her biological mother’s birth name but did not know how to contact her.
Eventually she found one of Eleanor’s old postcards in Sebastian’s archived legal files through Meridian’s records network.
She wrote a letter.
Eleanor answered.
They met quietly twice a year.
“Victor knew?” Rebecca asked.
“Not at first.”
Eleanor looked at Claire’s photograph.
“He found out last year.”
“How?”
“Claire confronted him about financial records at Meridian.”
Evelyn leaned forward.
“What records?”
“The Northcross transfers.”
Grant felt the case close around Victor again.
Eleanor continued.
“Claire said Victor had been moving money through Meridian for years.”
“Why?”
“She believed he was covering losses from a private investment fund.”
Grant knew the fund.
Lang Strategic Opportunities.
Victor had founded it before joining Hawthorne Holdings, then placed it in a blind management structure.
If it had failed, the public damage could have been enormous.
“How much money?” Grant asked.
“Claire estimated eighty million.”
Rebecca whispered, “That is not accounting fraud.”
“No,” Grant said.
“That is an empire.”
Eleanor wiped her eyes.
“Claire said she was going to tell Evelyn because she did not trust the board.”
Evelyn looked stunned.
“She never reached me.”
“She disappeared first.”
A vehicle approached outside.
Elias moved instantly to the window.
Headlights swept across the rain.
A black sedan stopped beside the farmhouse.
Grant stood.
“Victor?”
Elias looked at the license plate.
“Yes.”
Eleanor went pale.
“He found me.”
Grant moved toward the front room.
Evelyn caught his arm.
“Do not make this easy for him.”
Grant looked at her.
“What do you suggest?”
She pointed toward the dark hallway.
“Let him believe Eleanor is alone.”
Three minutes later, Grant, Evelyn, Rebecca, and Elias were hidden in the adjacent pantry with the door open one inch.
Eleanor sat at the kitchen table.
The rescue owner had taken the animals to the far barn and locked herself inside.
Victor knocked.
Eleanor opened the door.
Victor Lang entered carrying no weapon and no luggage.
He looked exhausted.
His silver hair was damp from rain.
His expensive coat hung open.
He saw Claire’s photograph on the table and stopped.
“Eleanor.”
“You should not have come.”
“I had no choice.”
“You always have a choice.”
Victor looked around.
“Where is Grant?”
Eleanor did not answer.
Victor gave a bitter laugh.
“Of course he is here.”
Grant stepped out.
Evelyn followed.
Victor saw her and all color left his face.
For once, the legendary CFO had no sentence ready.
Evelyn crossed her arms.
“Disappointed?”
Victor sat down slowly.
“No.”
His voice was barely audible.
“Relieved.”
Grant stared at him.
“Try again.”
Victor looked at Claire’s photograph.
“You think I did this.”
“We think you stole millions, manipulated Meridian, contacted Eleanor, and lied about where you were today.”
Victor nodded once.
“The last part is true.”
“And the rest?”
“Some of it.”
Grant’s expression hardened.
Victor looked at Eleanor.
“I came because Raymond Cole told me you were in danger.”
Evelyn laughed without humor.
“Everyone receives helpful warnings from Cole except me.”
Victor looked at her.
“Cole is the reason you survived.”
“You know that?”
“Yes.”
“Because you were involved?” Grant asked.
Victor shook his head.
“Because I was supposed to be the person who died on Ridgeway Road.”
No one spoke.
Grant stared at him.
Victor continued.
May you like
“Evelyn was never the original target.”
THE WOMAN BEHIND THE GLASS
