Chapter 7
We didn't go to the hospital first.
James drove us straight to the police station. Ethan had been picked up by a patrol car twenty minutes earlier—he'd managed to call 911 from the floor after the men left him unconscious.
He was waiting for us when we arrived, his lip split, a bruise blooming on his jaw.
"Thank god," he said, pulling me into his arms. He was careful of my ribs, but his embrace was tight. "I thought I'd lost you."
"I'm okay," I said. "We're all okay."
Detective Carter and Detective Mills were called in. It was three in the morning, but they arrived quickly.
We told them everything.
The journal. The embezzlement. Father's murder. The attempt on Mother's life. The two men Eleanor had hired. James told his side too—everything he knew, everything he'd been forced to do.
The detectives listened in stunned silence.
When we finished, Carter let out a long breath.
"This is... a lot," he said. "If what you're saying is true, this isn't just attempted murder. This is conspiracy. Fraud. Manslaughter. Possibly first-degree murder."
"It's all true," I said, sliding the journal across the table. "Everything's in there. Dates. Names. Amounts. She documented everything."
Mills picked up the journal, flipping through it. Her eyes widened as she read.
"This is... this is a confession," she said. "She wrote down everything. Including how she planned the 'accident' at the party. She even wrote that if pushing Claire down the stairs didn't work, she'd try something else at the house."
Carter stood up. "Okay. Here's what happens now. We put out an APB for Eleanor Hale and the two men she hired. We send a team to the estate. We get forensics in there. And we protect all of you. Twenty-four-hour security until this is over."
The next few hours were a blur.
Statements. Evidence collection. Phone calls.
By sunrise, the police had surrounded the estate. But Eleanor was gone. She'd taken her car, her passport, and five hundred thousand dollars in cash from the family safe. She was on the run.
"She'll try to leave the country," Carter told us. "We've alerted every airport, every border crossing. We'll find her."
But I knew Eleanor. She was smart. And desperate. She wouldn't be easy to catch.
We were taken to a safe house—a small, nondescript apartment in a quiet neighborhood. Two uniformed officers stood guard outside.
Mother was sleeping in the bedroom. James was in the kitchen, staring at a cup of coffee he hadn't touched. Ethan and I sat on the couch in the living room.
"She's going to come after us," I said quietly. "She knows we have everything. She knows her life is over unless she silences us."
"She won't get near us," Ethan said. "The police—"
"The police can't be everywhere," I interrupted. "And Eleanor has money. She has connections. She'll find a way."
James walked in from the kitchen. He looked terrible—pale, exhausted, broken.
"She will," he said. "You're right. Eleanor doesn't lose. Ever. She'd rather burn everything to the ground than admit defeat."
He sat down across from us.
"I know her better than anyone," he continued. "She has a place. A cabin up in the mountains. She bought it a few years ago, under a different name. No one knows about it but me. She used to go there when she wanted to disappear. If she's running... that's where she'll go."
"Do you have the address?" Carter asked, coming in from the other room. He'd been on the phone.
James nodded. He wrote it down on a piece of paper.
"It's remote," he said. "Ten miles from the nearest town. Accessible only by one road. She'll be heavily armed. She keeps guns there. Lots of them."
Carter looked at the address. "We'll send a SWAT team. At first light. If she's there, we'll get her."
The next few hours were the longest of my life.
We waited.
Mother woke up and joined us. No one spoke. We just sat, listening to the clock tick, waiting for the phone to ring.
At nine o'clock, it did.
Carter answered. He listened for a long time, his face serious.
Then he hung up.
"They found the cabin," he said. "It was empty. But they found evidence she was there. Food wrappers. A suitcase. She left about an hour before they arrived. She's still out there."
I closed my eyes. Of course she'd known. She always knew everything.
"She has contacts in the police," James said. "She's been paying off people for years. Someone must have tipped her off."
Carter swore under his breath. "I'll run this entire department through an investigation if I have to. No one protects her."
But it was too late for that.
May you like
Eleanor was gone.
And she was hunting us.
