Chapter 9 - LOCKER 317“IF MY MOTHER LEFT THAT KEY FOR ME, THEN SHE EXPECTED THIS NIGHT TO HAPPEN.”
Emily refused Daniel’s suggestion to wait for federal protection. If Richard had someone inside the investigation, calling the wrong person could expose everything.
They reached the storage facility shortly before midnight.
Locker 317 looked ordinary.
Inside, however, they found an entire hidden archive.
Anna had preserved bank records, photographs, audio tapes, passports, and handwritten journals. Daniel opened one ledger and immediately recognized names belonging to judges, corporate executives, and influential donors.
Richard had inherited only part of his father’s network.
Someone more powerful had controlled the rest.
Emily found a small recorder taped beneath a desk.
Anna’s voice played immediately.
“Richard is dangerous, but he isn’t the person I fear most.”
Margaret whispered, “Then who?”
Anna answered from eighteen years in the past.
“The man running everything calls himself Shepherd.”
Daniel suddenly went pale.
Emily noticed.
“You know that name.”
Before Daniel could answer, every light in the facility went out.
A red emergency lamp flickered on.
Then a voice came through the darkness.
“Leave the recorder, Emily.”
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She recognized the voice.
It belonged to the mysterious caller who had first warned her inside the Hale mansion.
