Chapter 6: The First Attempt
Detective Marcus Hale didn't ask another question.
"I'm on my way."
He ended the call, grabbed his jacket, and headed for the door.
Dana Price followed immediately.
"What happened?"
Hale kept walking.
"Someone tried to kill Adrian."
The words stopped everyone in the room.
Evelyn stared at him.
"What?"
"The county jail just reported an attempted attack."
Lila instinctively stepped closer to her sister.
Charles Bennett frowned.
"Was Adrian hurt?"
"I don't know yet."
Hale looked at Evelyn.
"I need to ask you something."
She nodded.
"Where were all of you during the last twenty minutes?"
Charles answered first.
"Right here."
Dana nodded.
"The security cameras can confirm that."
"So can the forensic staff," Noah Brooks added.
Hale gave a short nod.
"I didn't think it was any of you."
"Then why ask?" Evelyn said.
"Because if someone wants Adrian dead before he talks..."
He paused.
"...then this case just became much bigger."
Twenty-five minutes later...
Police lights flashed outside the Jefferson County Detention Center.
Hale parked and hurried inside.
A correctional officer met him in the lobby.
"I'm Officer Grant."
"Tell me everything."
Grant led him through several secured doors.
"Mr. Cole had just been processed."
"He was alone?"
"For about three minutes."
"And then?"
"A maintenance worker entered the holding corridor."
Hale stopped.
"Maintenance?"
Grant nodded.
"He was pushing a cleaning cart."
"What happened next?"
"The man suddenly pulled a sharpened piece of metal from inside a mop handle."
Hale's eyes narrowed.
"He went after Adrian?"
"Straight for him."
Inside the medical unit, Adrian sat on an examination table.
A white bandage wrapped around his left forearm.
The cut wasn't deep.
But it had come dangerously close to an artery.
Adrian looked exhausted.
His expensive suit had been replaced with a gray detention uniform.
For the first time since Hale had met him, Adrian looked genuinely frightened.
"You survived," Hale said.
"Barely."
"Tell me what happened."
Adrian rubbed his face.
"I thought he worked here."
"You'd never seen him before?"
"No."
"What did he say?"
Adrian hesitated.
Then quietly answered,
"Only one sentence."
"What was it?"
Adrian swallowed.
"He said..."
His voice became almost a whisper.
"...'Aster says you know too much.'"
Detective Hale felt a chill run down his spine.
"So Aster is real."
Adrian looked away.
"I told you."
"No."
Hale shook his head.
"You told me nothing."
An hour later...
The attacker sat handcuffed inside an interrogation room.
His name was Victor Mendez.
Forty-six years old.
No criminal record.
No employment history with the detention center.
Officer Grant entered.
"We checked."
"He used a fake identification badge."
Hale sat across from Victor.
"Who hired you?"
Victor smiled faintly.
"I don't know."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"I got instructions."
"From whom?"
"A phone."
"A burner phone?"
Victor nodded.
"Money was already in my account."
"How much?"
"Fifty thousand dollars."
"For murder?"
Victor looked down.
"I was told he couldn't be allowed to testify."
Hale leaned forward.
"Who said that?"
"I never heard a name."
"But?"
Victor closed his eyes.
"The messages were signed..."
He hesitated.
"...A."
Back at the Digital Forensics Unit...
Evelyn sat quietly beside Lila.
Neither sister had spoken much since Hale left.
Finally, Lila broke the silence.
"I should've gone to you sooner."
Evelyn smiled sadly.
"You came when it mattered."
"I almost didn't."
"Why?"
Lila looked toward the window.
"Because Adrian convinced me no one would believe me."
She paused.
"He wasn't entirely wrong."
Evelyn took her hand.
"I would've believed you."
"I wasn't sure."
Tears filled Lila's eyes.
"I watched him convince board members..."
"Investors..."
"Employees..."
"He could make anyone doubt what they already knew."
Charles quietly listened.
Then spoke.
"That's how manipulators survive."
"They don't create lies."
"They create confusion."
Everyone nodded.
Detective Hale returned just after midnight.
Dana immediately stood.
"How is Adrian?"
"Alive."
"What happened?"
Hale laid several photographs on the conference table.
One showed the fake maintenance uniform.
Another showed the sharpened metal weapon.
The final photograph showed a small piece of folded paper recovered from Victor's pocket.
Hale carefully unfolded the original evidence bag.
Inside was a handwritten note.
Only four words appeared on the page.
Loose ends never testify.
Silence filled the room.
Lila covered her mouth.
Charles slowly removed his glasses.
"This isn't intimidation anymore."
"No," Hale agreed.
"It's witness elimination."
Evelyn stared at the note.
"If someone wants Adrian dead..."
She looked at Hale.
"...then Adrian isn't the person running everything."
Hale nodded.
"I've reached the same conclusion."
Dana frowned.
"So where does that leave us?"
The detective looked toward the investigation board covered with photographs, contracts, shell companies, and financial records.
Then he picked up Adrian's picture.
For several seconds, he studied it.
Finally, he pinned another card directly above it.
Written in bold black letters were two words.
UNKNOWN LEADER
Hale stepped back.
"I think Adrian Cole spent years believing he was the mastermind."
He looked around the room.
"But tonight..."
He pointed to the new card.
"...we learned he may have been nothing more than someone else's puppet."
At that exact moment, nearly three hundred miles away, inside a secluded lakefront estate, a woman dressed in black stood before a wall of security monitors.
One screen showed Adrian being treated inside the jail's medical unit.
Another displayed Detective Hale leaving the detention center.
She calmly switched off the monitor.
Then she picked up an encrypted phone.
A distorted voice answered.
"He survived."
The woman remained perfectly composed.
"He won't survive the next mistake."
She ended the call, opened a locked drawer, and removed a photograph of Evelyn Mercer.
With a red marker, she drew a single circle around Evelyn's face.
Then she whispered to the empty room,
May you like
"If Adrian failed..."
"I'll finish Project Horizon myself."
