“Your brother was difficult.”
“Is he alive?”
Claire gasped.
Ava gripped the table.
June went still.
Victor Hale breathed softly through the line.
“Bring the ledger to the old ferry station by midnight,” he said. “Come alone.”
“No.”
“Then I stop being generous.”
The line clicked dead.
For several seconds, no one spoke.
Then June said, “Absolutely not.”
I turned to her.
“I have to go.”
“No, you don’t.”
“He knows we opened the box.”
“That means he’s watching.”
“Exactly.”
Claire shook her head. “We call the police.”
Ava looked at the ledger. “Dad said the police were part of it.”
“Not all of them,” Claire said.
“We don’t know which ones.”
