Ruiz killed the cabin lights.
Darkness swallowed the room.
Only the last gray light of evening remained between the pine trunks outside.
“Back room,” she whispered.
Derek reached for Olivia’s hand without thinking.
She let him take it.
They moved quickly toward the hallway while the two investigators positioned themselves near opposite windows.
Outside, gravel shifted beneath slow footsteps.
Not rushed.
That frightened Derek more.
Whoever had arrived believed they had time.
Ruiz spoke softly into her radio, giving coordinates and requesting immediate backup.
No response came.
She tried again.
Static.
“Signal’s weak,” she muttered.
One investigator pointed toward the rear of the cabin.
“We need to move them.”
Ruiz nodded.
Derek whispered, “There’s a back door through the utility room.”
He remembered the layout from childhood.
Thomas used to send him through that door to gather firewood.
They crossed the narrow hallway.
Behind them came a knock.
Three taps.
Derek stopped.
The same rhythm Richard had used at the apartment.
A man’s voice called from outside.
“Derek.”
Richard.
Olivia’s fingers tightened around his.
Ruiz signaled for silence.
Richard knocked again.
“I know you found it.”
Derek looked at Ruiz.
She shook her head.
Do not answer.
Another voice came from outside.
Older.
Calmer.
“You can’t keep what doesn’t belong to you.”
Olivia’s breathing changed.
Derek leaned close.
“Do you recognize him?”
She whispered, “No.”
But fear in her face suggested something about the voice disturbed her.
Richard spoke again.
“This does not have to become worse.”
One investigator slipped toward the rear exit.
He opened it slightly.
Then shut it immediately.
“Second vehicle behind the cabin.”
Ruiz’s jaw tightened.
They were surrounded.
Derek looked around the utility room.
Small window.
Washer.
Dryer.
Old shelves.
No easy route.
Ruiz whispered, “How many?”
The investigator held up two fingers, then pointed toward the rear.
At least two there.
Unknown in front.
Derek suddenly remembered something.
“There’s a crawlspace.”
Ruiz looked at him.
“Where?”
“Under the pantry.”
Thomas had shown him once during a plumbing repair.
A narrow service tunnel ran beneath part of the cabin toward an access hatch near the woodpile.
It was not designed as an escape route.
But it might become one.
They moved toward the kitchen.
Outside, Richard raised his voice.
“Derek, your father made the mistake of thinking paperwork could protect him.”
Derek stopped.
The sentence struck deeper than a threat.
Ruiz pulled him forward.
“Keep moving.”
They reached the pantry.
Derek removed a shelf.
Behind it was a square panel.
The screws had rusted.
An investigator used a multitool.
Outside, glass shattered.
Olivia flinched.
Something metallic rolled across the living room floor.
Ruiz shouted, “Down!”
A deafening bang followed.
Flash device.
Light burst through the hallway.
Derek’s ears rang.
The investigators responded immediately, moving toward cover.
Someone hit the front door.
Once.
Twice.
Wood cracked.
The pantry panel came free.
A black opening appeared.
Ruiz pushed Olivia toward it.
“Go.”
Olivia dropped to her knees.
Derek followed.
The crawlspace smelled of dirt, dry wood and old insulation.
Behind them came shouting.
A second crash.
Derek crawled forward.
The space narrowed until his shoulders brushed the joists.
Olivia moved ahead of him, breathing hard.
“Keep going,” he whispered.
They had gone perhaps twenty feet when a gunshot sounded inside the cabin.
Olivia stopped.
Derek nearly collided with her.
“Move.”
“What about Ruiz?”
“She told us to go.”
Another gunshot.
Then shouting.
They continued.
The crawlspace ended at a wooden hatch.
Derek pushed.
Nothing.
He pushed harder.
Locked from outside.
“Damn it.”
Olivia twisted around as much as the cramped space allowed.
“What?”
“It’s stuck.”
She felt along the frame.
“Kick it.”
“There’s no room.”
“Then use your shoulder.”
He drove upward.
The wood shifted slightly.
Again.
The latch splintered.
Cold evening air rushed in.
Derek climbed out behind the cabin.
Olivia followed.
The woodpile hid them from the rear driveway.
Voices came from the opposite side.
They crouched.
A man stood less than thirty yards away beside a dark pickup.
He held something long in one hand.
Derek could not tell whether it was a rifle until the man turned.
It was.
Olivia pulled Derek lower.
They moved behind the woodpile toward the trees.
Every dry branch beneath Derek’s shoes sounded impossibly loud.
He glanced back once.
The cabin door opened.
A shadow stepped outside.
They ran.
The slope behind the cabin descended sharply into the forest.
Derek caught Olivia’s elbow when she slipped on loose needles.
Behind them someone shouted.
“There!”
They ran faster.
A gunshot cracked through the trees.
Bark exploded from a pine trunk several feet away.
Olivia stumbled.
Derek grabbed her.
“Are you hit?”
“No.”
“Keep moving.”
They descended toward a dry creek bed Derek remembered from childhood hikes.
If they reached it, the terrain would hide them.
Another shot echoed.
Farther away this time.
They dropped into the creek bed.
Olivia bent forward, hands on her knees.
Derek listened.
No immediate footsteps.
“You okay?”
She nodded.
“Phone?”
She checked.
“No signal.”
His had none either.
They moved along the creek.
Darkness thickened beneath the trees.
Derek’s lungs burned.
He had not run like this in years.
After several minutes, Olivia whispered, “Stop.”
He turned.
“What?”
She pointed at the dirt.
Tire tracks.
Fresh.
The creek crossed an old forestry road.
Derek remembered where it led.
“Ranger station.”
“How far?”
“Maybe two miles.”
Olivia looked back.
“Then move.”
They followed the road.
For ten minutes neither spoke.
Then Olivia said, “Richard knew about the cabin.”
“Apparently.”
“He may have followed us.”
“Or tracked one of the investigators.”
“Or tracked me.”
Derek looked at her.
She held up her phone.
“I changed devices twice.”
“That doesn’t mean anything if someone knows your accounts.”
Olivia’s face tightened.
“Samuel warned me.”
“About what?”
“Someone accessed one of my cloud accounts yesterday.”
Derek stopped.
“You didn’t tell me.”
“I found out while we were driving north.”
“You should have said something.”
She stared at him.
For one sharp moment, the irony hung between them.
Then Derek almost laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because he had finally heard himself.
Olivia’s mouth twitched despite the fear.
“You see the problem?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
He shook his head.
“Later.”
“Definitely later.”
They continued.
A vehicle engine sounded somewhere behind them.
Headlights flickered through distant trees.
Derek pulled Olivia off the road.
They crouched behind a fallen trunk.
A black pickup rolled slowly along the forestry road.
The same vehicle from the cabin.
Its headlights swept over the branches.
Derek pressed lower.
Olivia’s shoulder touched his.
The truck passed.
Then stopped.
Reverse lights came on.
Derek’s heart hammered.
The truck backed toward them.
Olivia whispered, “They saw something.”
Derek searched the darkness.
To their left, the terrain climbed sharply.
To the right, the creek dropped into a deeper ravine.
He chose the ravine.
They slid downward through brush.
Branches scratched his arms.
Olivia nearly fell, and he caught her around the waist.
The pickup doors opened above.
Voices.
One man said, “They came this way.”
Derek and Olivia moved deeper.
The ravine ended at a narrow culvert beneath the road.
They crawled inside.
Mud soaked Derek’s knees.
The concrete pipe was barely large enough for both.
Footsteps approached overhead.
Olivia’s breathing sounded too loud.
Derek placed a finger against his lips.
A flashlight beam crossed the far opening.
Someone descended.
Slowly.
The light moved closer.
Derek felt Olivia’s hand find his.
The beam reached the mouth of the culvert.
Then stopped.
A phone rang outside.
The man cursed.
“Yeah?”
Pause.
“What?”
Another pause.
“Police?”
The flashlight moved away.
Footsteps retreated.
Derek waited until the engine started.
The truck accelerated away.
For another full minute, neither moved.
Then Olivia whispered, “Ruiz.”
“Maybe.”
“Or backup.”
They crawled out.
Signal returned as they climbed toward higher ground.
Derek’s phone flooded with missed alerts.
One message from Ruiz.
SAFE. TWO OFFICERS INJURED. RICHARD FLED. GET TO RANGER STATION. DO NOT RETURN.
Derek exhaled.
“She’s alive.”
Olivia closed her eyes briefly.
“Thank God.”
They reached the ranger station after dark.
Two deputies met them there.
An ambulance arrived minutes later.
Derek had cuts along his forearms and a bruised shoulder.
Olivia had twisted her ankle but refused transport until Ruiz called.
“You both need to stay put,” Ruiz said.
“Who attacked the cabin?” Derek asked.
“We have one person in custody.”
“Who?”
“Not Richard.”
“Then who?”
“A man named Curtis Malloy.”
Olivia looked at Derek.
Neither recognized the name.
Ruiz continued.
“He has prior arrests related to debt collection, intimidation and fraud.”
“Connected to Victor Dane?”
“We’re checking.”
“What about the ledger?”
“Safe.”
Derek’s relief lasted only a second.
“Richard?”
“Gone.”
“My mother?”
“No verified location.”
Olivia sat on the edge of a desk, ankle wrapped in ice.
Ruiz’s voice softened.
“There’s something else you should know.”
Derek put the phone on speaker.
“We recovered a second vehicle near the cabin.”
“Whose?”
“It’s registered to a company linked to Marjorie Hale.”
Derek stared at the floor.
His mother had helped bring armed men to his father’s cabin.
The idea should have shocked him.
Instead it felt like another door opening onto a hallway he was beginning to recognize.
Ruiz continued.
“In the vehicle we found photographs.”
“What kind?”
“Surveillance photographs.”
“Of who?”
“You. Olivia. Samuel. My office.”
Olivia’s face drained.
“And?”
Ruiz paused.
“One set appears much older.”
“How old?”
“Possibly ten or twelve years.”
Derek’s pulse changed.
“Of who?”
“Robert Bennett.”
Olivia stood despite her injured ankle.
“What?”
“The photos show a man we believe may be your father.”
“Where?”
“Various locations. Some are dated.”
Olivia gripped the desk.
“What dates?”
“The latest is eight years ago.”
Olivia looked stunned.
“My father disappeared fifteen years ago.”
“If the photographs are authentic, he was alive at least seven years after that.”
Derek moved closer to her.
“Where were they taken?”
Ruiz hesitated.
“Mexico. Arizona. New Mexico.”
Olivia’s eyes filled.
“Why would Marjorie have those?”
“We don’t know yet.”
Derek did not need proof to imagine the possibilities.
Monitoring.
Searching.
Threatening.
Maybe controlling.
Ruiz continued.
“There’s one photograph we cannot explain.”
“What?”
“It shows Robert with another man outside a motel near Flagstaff.”
“Who?”
“We’re still identifying him.”
“Send it.”
A moment later Derek’s phone chimed.
The photograph loaded slowly.
Robert Bennett stood beside a motel railing, older than the man Derek had seen in childhood pictures.
Beside him was a thin gray-haired man wearing glasses.
Derek enlarged the image.
His stomach dropped.
He knew that man.
Olivia noticed his expression.
“What?”
Derek turned the screen toward her.
“That’s Dr. Alan Mercer.”
“Who?”
“My father’s physician.”
Olivia stared at the photograph.
“The doctor who treated Thomas before he died?”
“Yes.”
The room went silent.
Derek looked again at the date printed along the bottom.
Eight years earlier.
Two years before Thomas Hale died.
Robert Bennett had been alive.
He had been meeting privately with Thomas’s doctor.
And Marjorie had possessed a photograph of them together.
Derek called Ruiz back.
“My mother knew Robert was alive.”
“Possibly.”
“She had someone following him.”
“Likely.”
“And he met my father’s doctor.”
“Yes.”
Derek looked at Olivia.
A terrible thought surfaced.
“What if Robert didn’t disappear because he stole something?”
Olivia’s voice was barely above a whisper.
“What if he disappeared because he knew what they were doing?”
Neither of them said the next possibility aloud.
Not until Derek’s phone received another message from Ruiz.
We identified the handwritten note on the back of the photo.
Derek opened the image.
Three words were written in Marjorie’s handwriting.
MERCER KNOWS EVERYTHING.
Click here to continue reading: PART 8: A Photograph Linking Robert Bennett to Thomas’s Doctor Uncovers a Hidden Meeting and Forces Derek to Question How His Father Really Died
When a Declined Card Turned a Grocery Checkout Into the First Crack in Derek Hale’s Marriage and Family
Part 7 of 18
