CHAPTER 4 – The Secret Richard Could Never Discover
The old man never took his eyes off the men in black suits.
"Drop your weapons."
For a split second, no one moved.
Then the sound of dozens of boots echoed through the terminal.
Federal agents poured through every entrance, rifles raised.
"Federal Bureau of Investigation! Hands where we can see them!"
Panic spread across the faces of Richard Halston's men.
Within seconds, they were surrounded.
The leader laughed anyway.
"You've already lost."
He reached into his jacket.
The agents instantly aimed their rifles.
But instead of a gun, he pulled out a cell phone.
He pressed one button.
Across town...
A black luxury sedan stopped outside Noah's elementary school.
Another team climbed out.
Inside the terminal, the leader smiled.
"You think the boy is the only leverage we have?"
Ethan's heart sank.
"What have you done?"
"We're not after Noah..."
"We're after someone much more valuable."
The old man suddenly turned pale.
"My safe house..."
The leader grinned wider.
"Exactly."
Before anyone could stop him, the phone's speaker came alive.
A frightened woman's voice cried out.
"They found us! They're inside!"
Then came the sound of breaking glass...
A scream...
And the line went dead.
The old man's hands trembled for the first time in twenty-five years.
Everything he had hidden...
Every piece of evidence proving Richard Halston stole the invention...
Every original patent...
Every financial record...
Every recording...
Was inside that safe house.
If Richard's men reached it first, decades of evidence would disappear forever.
Ethan looked at his father in disbelief.
"You've been collecting proof all these years?"
The old man nodded slowly.
"I wasn't hiding to save myself."
"I was hiding long enough to destroy the man who ruined our family."
Just then, Noah quietly tugged on Ethan's sleeve.
"Dad..."
"I don't think they're telling the whole truth."
Everyone turned toward the little boy.
Noah slowly reached inside the teddy bear he had carried everywhere since he was four years old.
A tiny hidden zipper opened.
He pulled out a small silver flash drive.
"I found this sewn inside Teddy years ago," Noah whispered.
"I thought it was just part of the toy."
The old man's eyes filled with tears.
"No..."
"That's impossible."
He recognized the flash drive instantly.
It contained the only digital backup of every secret Richard Halston had spent twenty-five years trying to erase.
The safe house had only been a decoy.
The real evidence...
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Had been traveling through airports, schools, and playgrounds in the arms of a little boy all along.
And Richard Halston had absolutely no idea.
