CHAPTER 15
Ten Minutes to Save My Son
“I choose Jayce.”
Tasha pulled the flash drive away before I could take it.
“You can’t.”
“My son is somewhere with a gun pointed at him.”
“And if you activate this, somebody else’s son dies.”
“I don’t care.”
The words came out before I could soften them.
The truth was, I did care.
I cared about the hundreds of people whose names might be attached to that ledger. I cared about their children, their mothers, and everybody who would have to bury them.
But I cared about Jayce more.
Maybe that made me selfish.
Maybe it made me a monster.
Or maybe it made me exactly what Victor Hale already believed I was.
A mother willing to burn down the world for her child.
The countdown continued.
08:46
08:45
08:44
Dymond stepped between me and Tasha.
“Plugging in the ledger doesn’t guarantee Victor releases him.”
“It gets me closer.”
“It could also activate every contract.”
“You got another idea?”
“We copy the drive.”
“With what?”
She pointed toward the computer behind the hidden panel.
“The system has multiple ports.”
“That’s the same computer Rome told us to use.”
“We don’t insert the ledger into the main port. We connect it through an external drive first.”
Tasha looked at the screen.
“And if the program activates automatically?”
“Then we pull it.”
“You don’t know what kind of system this is.”
“No,” Dymond said. “But I know someone who might.”
She took out her phone and made a video call.
A man answered after two rings.
He looked half asleep until he saw Dymond’s face.
Then he sat up.
“D?”
“I need you.”
“What happened?”
“I’m sending you an image.”
She turned the camera toward the computer.
The man’s expression changed.
“Where the hell did you find that?”
“Can you access it remotely?”
“Maybe. What is it?”
“A succession terminal.”
“That sounds illegal.”
“It is.”
“How illegal?”
Dymond glanced at Lawson’s blood on Tasha’s shirt.
“Federal-prison-for-the-rest-of-your-life illegal.”
The man sighed.
“So, a regular favor.”
“Can you help or not, Meech?”
The name caught my attention.
I had heard it before.
Meech had been part of Dymond’s crew when she ran the streets with Ace and Rico. If anybody could break into a Carter system, it made sense that she would call somebody who had survived her old life.
Meech told her to connect the phone to the computer using a cable from beneath the desk.
Dymond searched the hidden compartment and found one.
“Once it connects, don’t touch anything,” he said. “Especially the drive.”
Tasha still held the ledger.
“You heard him,” she said.
I looked at the countdown.
07:53
“This better work.”
Amaya clung to my leg.
I picked her up and carried her to the back office.
“Momma has to do something.”
“I want Jayce.”
“I know.”
“Is the police man going to hurt him?”
“No.”
“You promise?”
The word broke something inside me.
I had made too many promises to my children since this nightmare started.
Stay in the car.
I’ll be right back.
You’re safe.
I’m coming.
Every promise had been followed by another danger.
I kissed her forehead.
“I promise I’m bringing your brother home.”
I placed Amaya beneath the office desk and pushed a filing cabinet in front of the window.
“Stay here until Auntie Tasha or I come get you.”
“I’m scared.”
“So am I.”
She looked surprised.
Adults weren’t supposed to admit fear to children.
But I was done building my family out of lies.
“Being scared doesn’t mean we stop,” I told her. “It means we hold on tighter.”
She wrapped her arms around my neck.
“I love you, Momma.”
“I love you too.”
When I returned to the front, Dymond had connected the phone.
Meech’s face disappeared, replaced by lines of code moving across the computer screen.
“Connection established,” his voice said through the speaker. “Insert the drive into the left port.”
Tasha shook her head.
“What if you’re wrong?”
“I’m not.”
“That isn’t enough.”
“Tasha,” I said, “give me the ledger.”
She stared at me.
Then at the countdown.
06:58
Finally, she placed the flash drive in my palm.
The device was small.
Light.
It didn’t feel like something capable of killing hundreds of people.
But guns were small too.
So were bullets.
I inserted it into the left port.
The screen turned black.
For one terrifying second, nothing happened.
Then white letters appeared.
MASTER LEDGER DETECTED
READ-ONLY MODE
Tasha released a breath.
Meech began working.
Folders appeared across the screen faster than I could read them.
Police departments.
Courts.
Banks.
Shipping companies.
Hospitals.
Funeral homes.
Churches.
The Circle had touched everything.
Names filled the screen.
Judges I recognized from television.
Politicians whose signs covered Louisville every election year.
Police officers.
Federal agents.
Business owners.
Pastors.
Men who preached salvation on Sunday and accepted murder money by Monday.
A progress bar appeared.
COPYING FILES: 4%
“That’s going too slow,” I said.
“I can’t make forty years of corruption move faster,” Meech answered.
The countdown reached six minutes.
Another box appeared.
EXECUTION PROTOCOL FOUND
STATUS: DORMANT
Dymond leaned toward the screen.
“Can you delete it?”
“Not without opening the program.”
“Then open it.”
“If I open it, I might trigger it.”
“Can you disable the terminal?”
“That could erase the ledger.”
“I don’t care about the ledger,” I said. “Find my son.”
“That information isn’t on the drive.”
“Then trace Rome’s call.”
“You got the number?”
I handed Dymond my phone.
Meech began tracing it remotely.
While he worked, Tasha moved toward the front windows.
The street outside was empty.
Too empty.
The police who surrounded the bank hadn’t reached my store.
Nobody had.
Victor had cleared the area.
“He’s close,” Tasha said.
“Who?”
“Victor.”
Dymond looked toward the entrance.
“You think he came to Louisville?”
“He wouldn’t trust Rome with nearly a billion dollars.”
A message appeared on the computer.
REMOTE ACCESS REQUESTED
USER: VHALE
Meech cursed.
“He found us.”
“Block him,” Dymond said.
“I’m trying.”
The screen flickered.
Victor’s face appeared.
He was no longer sitting in front of the silver circle.
Behind him was darkness.
Concrete.
A single hanging light.
Jayce sat in a chair beneath it.
His hands were tied in front of him.
My baby had tears running down his face.
But he wasn’t crying loudly.
He was trying to be brave.
“Momma,” he whispered.
I touched the screen.
“Jayce, I’m here.”
Victor stepped into view behind him.
“Insert the ledger into the center port.”
“It’s already connected.”
“You placed it in read-only mode.”
“I’m following instructions.”
“Not mine.”
“You said ten minutes.”
“And you have five remaining.”
“Let me speak to my son.”
“You’re speaking to him.”
“Alone.”
Victor smiled.
“You aren’t in a position to negotiate.”
I looked at Jayce.
“Did they hurt you?”
He shook his head.
“Where’s Rome?”
Jayce glanced toward someone off-camera.
“Don’t look at him,” Victor said.
That told me Rome was there.
“Rome!” I shouted. “If anything happens to my son, every Carter in this city will hunt you.”
Rome stepped into the light.
He had a bruise beneath one eye and blood on his shirt.
His hands weren’t tied, but a man behind him held a gun against his back.
Rome hadn’t taken Jayce willingly.
At least, not completely.
“They got my daughter,” he said.
“What daughter?”
His face tightened.
“Her name is Laila.”
I had never heard of her.
Victor had found everybody’s weakness.
Nesha.
My children.
Rome’s daughter.
Dymond’s need to know her father.
Tasha’s guilt.
My mother’s secrets.
He didn’t control people with loyalty.
He controlled them by discovering who they couldn’t afford to lose.
“Where is Laila?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Rome said. “They took her yesterday.”
Victor pressed the gun against Jayce’s temple.
“Touching reunion, but time is passing.”
The countdown reached four minutes.
03:59
“Show me Laila,” I said.
Victor’s eyes hardened.
“This isn’t about her.”
“If you want Rome to keep cooperating, prove she’s alive.”
Rome looked at me.
He understood.
I wasn’t stalling for him.
I was stalling for Meech.
Victor gestured toward someone outside the camera.
The image changed.
A teenage girl appeared on the screen.
She sat inside a vehicle with tape across her mouth and her wrists tied.
Rome stepped forward.
“Laila!”
The gunman behind him struck him across the head.
He dropped to one knee.
The screen returned to Victor and Jayce.
“Both children live if you activate succession.”
“What happens after I do?”
“The empire transfers to its heir.”
“Jayce.”
“Yes.”
“And the execution contracts?”
“Necessary cleanup.”
“How many people die?”
“People whose deaths should not concern you.”
“Give me a number.”
Victor smiled.
“Two hundred and twelve.”
Tasha covered her mouth.
Dymond stared at her father with disgust.
“You would kill more than two hundred people for money?”
Victor looked directly at her.
“I built the Circle before you were born. Money is the least important thing it owns.”
“Then why do you want the empire?”
“Because Karen stole my network and hid it inside Carter accounts.”
Dymond stepped closer.
“Did you ever want me?”
Victor studied her face.
The question seemed to surprise him.
“Your mother made you a liability.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
He didn’t answer.
Dymond nodded slowly.
Something inside her closed.
Whatever hope she had carried into the bank died in that moment.
Meech’s voice whispered through Dymond’s phone.
“I found the call source.”
I kept my face still.
“Where?” Dymond asked softly.
“Old meatpacking plant near Butchertown.”
I knew the building.
It was less than fifteen minutes away.
Too far.
The countdown showed three minutes.
Victor had to be closer than that if he was controlling the terminal directly.
Unless someone else was inside the store.
A floorboard creaked behind us.
I turned.
One of Dymond’s men stood near the tunnel entrance.
The wounded one.
The man we had helped escape the bank.
His shirt was covered in blood, but his gun hand was steady.
He aimed at Tasha.
“Give me the drive.”
Dymond stared at him.
“Brandon?”
“Sorry, D.”
“How long?”
“Six months.”