Zoe
The name on the paper is David Harrow, and I stare at it like it is the face of the man who has been feeding Evelyn information about my mother, the man who has been watching her room, reporting her movements, making sure Evelyn knows exactly where she is at all times. Liam puts the photograph in front of me, a middle-aged man in a security guard uniform, and I feel the anger rise in my chest, hot and familiar, the same anger I felt when Evelyn showed me my mother's face in that café.
"He works at Westbrook Medical Centre," Liam says, and his voice is low, controlled, the voice of a man who has been hunting for two years. "He has been there for six months. He was placed there by Evelyn to watch your mother, to make sure she did not leave, to make sure you did not try to take her somewhere safe."
I look at the photograph, at the man who has been standing outside my mother's room while I sat by her bed and held her hand and pretended that everything was going to be okay. I think about the times I saw him in the hallway, the way he looked at me, the way he smiled, the way he said good morning like he was just another guard doing his job. He was not doing his job. He was waiting for Evelyn to tell him to move her, to hurt her, to kill her if I did not do what I was told.
"How do we take him down?" I ask, and my voice is flat, the anger burning so hot it has turned to ice, and I look at Liam and I let him see that I am ready, that I have been ready since the moment I walked into his office.
He pulls out another paper, a list of names and dates and transactions, and he slides it across the desk toward me. "He has been taking money from Evelyn for years, moving it through accounts, hiding it from the people he works for. We have proof, enough to put him away for a long time. But we do not go to the police, not yet. We go to him. We make him an offer he cannot refuse."
I look at the paper, at the evidence that will destroy this man, and I feel something shift in my chest, something that feels like power, like control, like the first breath I have taken since this started. "What kind of offer?" I ask, and I look at Liam, at the man who has been planning this for two years, at the man who is going to help me take back my mother's life.
"He tells us everything he knows about Evelyn's operation," Liam says, and his voice is low, steady, the voice of a man who has already won. "He tells us who she talks to, where she goes, how she moves her money. And in return, we do not send him to prison. We let him walk away, disappear, start a new life somewhere she cannot find him."
I nod, and I stand up, and I look at the photograph of the man who has been standing outside my mother's room, and I feel the anger in my chest, but I also feel something else, something that feels like hope. "When do we do it?" I ask, and my voice is steady, the steel back in place.
"Tonight," Liam says, and he stands up and he walks toward me, and he takes my hand and he holds it, and I feel the warmth of him, the strength of him, the promise that he is not going to let me fall. "We go to him tonight, and we end this."
The parking garage is dark and cold, and I sit in the back of the car with Liam beside me, his hand on my knee, his eyes watching the door where David Harrow is supposed to appear. Marcus is in the front seat, his hands on the wheel, his eyes on the mirror, waiting for the signal. I look at the door and I think about my mother, about the way she smiled this morning when I walked into her room, about the way she held my hand and told me she was not afraid anymore, about the way she looked at me like I was the only thing that mattered.
I am not going to let her down. I am not going to let Evelyn take her, not now, not ever.
The door opens and David Harrow steps out, his uniform wrinkled, his face tired, his eyes scanning the garage the way they have been trained to do. He does not see us, does not see the car, does not see the trap that is closing around him. Liam squeezes my hand and I open the door and I step out, and I walk toward him, my footsteps echoing on the concrete, my heart pounding in my chest.
He sees me and he stops, and I see the recognition in his eyes, the fear, the guilt. "Miss Vance," he says, and his voice is thin, the voice of a man who knows he has been caught. "What are you doing here?"
I stop in front of him, and I look at his face, at the man who has been watching my mother, reporting her movements, waiting for Evelyn to give the order. "I know who you work for," I say, and my voice is steady, the steel back in place, and I see his face change, the fear turning to something else, something that looks like resignation. "I know what you have been doing. And I know that you are going to tell me everything, or you are going to spend the rest of your life in a prison cell, wondering what happened to the people you thought were protecting you."
He looks at me for a long moment, and I see the fight go out of him, the hope that he could talk his way out of this, that he could run, that he could hide. "You do not understand," he says, and his voice is low, broken, the voice of a man who has been running for so long he has forgotten how to stop. "She will kill me. She will kill all of us. She does not let people walk away."
I step closer, and I see the fear in his eyes, the same fear I have been carrying since the moment I took that envelope from Evelyn Cole. "She is not going to kill anyone," I say, and my voice is low, steady, the voice of a woman who has already decided how this ends. "She is going to prison, and you are going to help us put her there. You are going to tell us everything, and when this is over, you are going to disappear, and she is never going to find you."
He looks at me, and I see the hope in his eyes, the same hope I felt when Liam told me he was going to save my mother. "How do I know you can protect me?" he asks, and his voice is thin, desperate, the voice of a man who has been running for so long he has forgotten what safety feels like.
I turn and I look at the car, at Liam standing in the shadows, his face hard, his eyes dark, the man who has been hunting Evelyn for two years. "Because he has been hunting her longer than you have been running from her," I say, and I see David's eyes follow mine, see the recognition in his face, the fear, the hope. "And he is going to win."