Chapter 43 - The Shadow of Harlan Cross
Harlan Cross was not a woodsman or a mill worker. He was the corporate attorney from Grand Rapids who had laundered Raymond’s forged timber contracts for fifteen years—a man who wore three-piece wool suits and smelled of expensive pomade and courtroom perjury. If he was here with three vehicles while Raymond lay handcuffed to a hospital gurney, it meant one thing: Raymond wasn't the mastermind. He was merely the blunt instrument.
"We can't take the driveway," Ellis said, his tactical instincts instantly overriding the shock of the telephone call. He grabbed my coat from the ruined settee, wrapping it around my shoulders before hauling me toward the back scullery. "Miller left two deputies at the township crossroads, but if Cross has paperwork, he’ll tie them up in jurisdictional nonsense while his men search this house down to the lath."
"The key is for the First Merchants Bank on LaSalle Street in Chicago," I said, clutching the yellowed envelope tightly against my ribs. "Look at the ink, Ellis. It’s fresh blue script on the margin. It says *Box 414 – Eleanor’s Trust*. The coroner declared my mother dead after her car plunged into the Kalamazoo River in November of 1994. But this key was issued in 1997."
"Your mother faked her death," Ellis breathed, pulling the heavy bolt on the back kitchen door. "Or Sanford helped her disappear to keep Raymond from killing her."
"And whatever is in Box 414 strips Harlan Cross and Raymond of every square inch of the Vance empire," I realized, the puzzle pieces clicking together with sickening clarity. "That’s why Raymond slapped me at the wedding reception. It wasn't just about the walnut gift box. He knew Sanford had hidden the real conveyance somewhere only I could unlock."
A sharp crunch of tires on wet gravel echoed from the front turnaround. Doors slammed in rapid succession.
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"Search the ground floor!" Harlan Cross’s crisp, arrogant voice drifted through the drafty corridors. "The girl and her husband haven't left yet—their truck is still parked by the barn. Find the floorboard behind the chimney before the state troopers seal the estate!"
We slipped out through the scullery door into the bitter morning air, keeping low against the stone foundation. The thick hemlock hedge provided cover, but we had less than two minutes before Cross's hired hands circled the perimeter.
