The Empty House
Chapter 15 - The Empty House
Lena refused to let Sarah or Mack approach the house.
A state tactical unit surrounded the property from a distance while Patricia drove through the gate alone.
She carried a child-sized jacket stuffed with towels so the back seat appeared occupied.
Mack watched from inside an unmarked van.
Every instinct told him to run toward the house.
Sarah sat beside him holding Eli’s hand.
Eli had insisted on coming to the command area after learning that Patricia was helping.
“Is Grant going to jail?” he asked.
“If they find him,” Lena said.
Patricia entered the unfinished house.
Five minutes passed.
Then ten.
No lights came on.
No movement appeared behind the windows.
Lena sent officers inside.
The house was empty.
A portable speaker sat in the living room playing a recording of Grant’s voice.
Beside it was a burning metal container filled with documents.
Officers extinguished the fire, but most of the papers were destroyed.
Grant had known they were coming.
Patricia collapsed on the front steps.
“He used me again.”
Mack examined the road from the van.
A delivery truck had passed them moments before Patricia arrived.
It had not seemed important.
Now Mack remembered the driver’s cap pulled low over his face.
“Check the truck,” he told Lena.
Traffic cameras showed it turning toward town.
The truck belonged to Ridgeway Distribution—the company attempting to buy Eli’s land.
Claire contacted the company’s attorney.
Ridgeway denied helping Grant, but one senior executive had approved several private payments to Grant’s construction business.
The land sale had never been an ordinary transaction.
Grant had promised the company access to a future highway interchange. He did not own the land, but he had accepted advance payments.
If the sale failed, he owed money he no longer had.
That evening, police found the delivery truck near the bus station.
The driver was unconscious but alive.
Grant had stolen his uniform.
Security footage showed Grant boarding a northbound bus.
Lena studied the passenger list.
“He didn’t use his own name.”
“What name did he use?” Sarah asked.
Lena turned the screen toward them.
Daniel Borden.
May you like
Grant was not only running from his crimes.
He was trying to disappear inside the identity of the man he had killed.
