The Driver Who Never Died
Chapter 06 - The Driver Who Never Died
The name was Elias Ward. Adrian had heard it once or twice as a child, usually in a story his father told when he wanted to remind the household that loyalty was more valuable than money. Elias had driven the Voss family for nearly twenty years. Officially, he had died in the warehouse fire alongside Carlo Voss. There had been no funeral, only a closed casket and a photograph in the newspaper.
“Why would Victor keep him alive?” Adrian asked.
Marlene rubbed her palms against her trousers. “Because Elias was carrying something the night of the fire. He knew where your father had hidden the second ledger. Victor wanted the location, but Elias refused to tell him. I heard them argue about it in the office. Victor said a man could be made to remember if he was given enough time.”
Sophie felt sick. “You knew someone was being held?”
“I knew someone was locked in a place I wasn’t allowed to enter. I didn’t know it was Elias until I saw his name on a file.” Marlene looked down. “I told myself it was none of my business. I have been telling myself that for years.”
Adrian’s voice stayed quiet. “That excuse has cost a lot of people a lot of years.”
Marlene nodded, accepting it. “I can show you the building. I can’t promise he’s still there.”
Miriam objected immediately. She wanted the police contacted, the evidence documented, and a warrant obtained before anyone went near the warehouse. Adrian agreed to bring her in, but said they could not wait until morning. If Victor believed Lydia was back, he might move Elias or destroy whatever remained of the records.
In the end, they compromised. Miriam contacted a federal investigator she trusted and sent him the available information. He promised to meet them at the warehouse perimeter with a small team. Adrian, Sophie, and Marcus would approach only after the team was in position. Marlene would remain with Miriam.
Sophie could have stayed behind. She had no training for dangerous buildings, no experience with family conspiracies, and a wrist that still hurt from the way she had twisted it while moving a heavy table at work. But she had watched too many people decide that a frightened person was someone else’s responsibility.
“I’m coming,” she told Adrian.
“No.”
“That was quick.”
“This isn’t a restaurant where you can walk out if someone raises their voice.”
“I know that.”
“Then why would you come?”
“Because I can hear when someone is being treated like an inconvenience. And because Elias may be the only person who can tell us what happened that night.”
Adrian studied her, searching for the recklessness he expected to find. What he saw instead was fear held in check by a decision she had already made.
“You stay behind Marcus,” he said at last. “If he tells you to move, you move. No arguments.”
“I can agree to that.”
“And if anything changes, we leave.”
“I can agree to that, too.”
The old warehouse stood beside the river, its brick walls dark with rain and its windows boarded. A chain-link fence surrounded the lot. The building had been scheduled for demolition twice, but the permits had stalled. Now the place looked less abandoned than deliberately forgotten.
The federal team positioned itself at the far gate. Marcus cut the chain on a side entrance only after the lead investigator gave the signal. Inside, the air smelled of wet concrete and rust. A line of old offices ran along the first floor. The power had been cut, but a generator hummed somewhere below.
They found a narrow staircase behind a metal cabinet. At the bottom was a door with a new lock.
Adrian took the brass key from Lydia’s bag. It fit.
The room beyond was small and bare. A cot stood against one wall, beside a sink and a stack of unopened food containers. An older man sat at a table, his gray hair grown long around his ears. He was thin enough that the sleeves of his shirt hung loosely from his arms, but when the light fell across his face, his eyes were unmistakable.
Elias Ward looked up.
For several seconds, he said nothing. Then he stared at Adrian as if the years had folded in half.
“Carlo’s boy,” he whispered.
“I’m not a boy anymore.”
“No,” Elias said. “You’re the man I was afraid you’d become.”
Adrian did not answer. Sophie stepped closer, keeping her hands visible. She set a bottle of water and a wrapped sandwich on the table. Elias looked at the food first, then at her.
“Are you with him?”
“I’m with the people who want you out of here.”
He took the water with shaking hands. Sophie waited while he drank, then asked whether he could stand. He said he could, though it took him two tries.
Outside the room, the federal investigator began photographing the lock and the cot. Marcus found a camera concealed in a ventilation grille. Its cable ran through the wall toward an office upstairs.
Elias noticed the camera and went pale. “He’s been watching. He always watches.”
“Victor?” Adrian asked.
Elias nodded. “He wanted to know whether I’d told anyone about the ledger. I didn’t. I swore to your father I’d protect it.”
“What happened the night of the fire?”
Elias looked at Adrian, then Sophie. His gaze lingered on her, and his expression changed in a way that made her uneasy.
“Your father was alive when I left the house,” he said. “Your mother was alive, too. But the fire was already burning when I got to the back door.”
Adrian took one step closer. “You said my father died in the warehouse.”
“I was told to say that. I was told the boy had been rescued and the woman was dead.” Elias’s voice broke. “I believed Victor had killed them both. Then I found out your mother had escaped.”
Lydia, standing in the doorway with Miriam’s investigator, closed her eyes.
Elias looked directly at Sophie.
“And I know why Victor has been watching you, too.”
Sophie’s stomach tightened. “Why?”
“Because your mother was the last person who helped Lydia hide after the fire.”
The room fell silent.
Sophie felt the words land, each one opening a memory she had never understood: her mother’s sudden move from Milwaukee, the letters she kept in a flour tin, the old photograph she had refused to explain.
Elias reached into his shirt and drew out a small envelope, yellowed at the edges.
“Your mother gave me this,” he said. “She told me to keep it until the girl with the blue recipe book came looking.”
Sophie’s breath caught.
May you like
Her mother’s recipe book was at home, tucked in the bottom drawer of her kitchen cabinet.
And someone had known exactly where to look for it.
