Chapter 7 - Luis Hid Evidence In California
Rachel called her mother.
Marisol Morales lived in Arizona now.
When Rachel asked about Luis’s notebooks, Marisol began crying.
“He told me never to give them to anyone from Chicago.”
Rachel stood.
“You have them?”
“Not exactly.”
Before Luis died, he placed a metal toolbox in storage.
Marisol had moved it twice without opening the false bottom he
described.
Rachel had assumed the toolbox contained old mechanic tools.
It contained records.
The problem was getting them safely.
Ethan offered his jet.
Rachel refused.
Then reconsidered for a practical reason.
Not because he was powerful.
Because commercial travel would take too long, and Marcus was still
missing.
Danielle arranged the trip.
Rachel insisted Elena come too.
Ethan agreed.
His security team traveled separately.
Nobody took Sophie from Rachel without asking.
On the flight to Arizona, Ethan sat across from her.
Sophie slept between them in an approved infant restraint.
Rachel looked at him.
“Why are you helping me?”
Ethan took time before answering.
“Because my family helped create the thing chasing you.”
“You didn’t know.”
“That changes blame. It doesn’t eliminate responsibility for what I do
after I know.”
Rachel studied him.
The newspapers called him the King of Chicago.
He did not sound like a king.
He sounded like a man exhausted by inheritance.
Marisol met them at a bank storage facility.
Inside Luis’s toolbox, beneath a removable tray, were three mileage
books and a cassette tape.
Luis’s handwriting filled every page.
Dates.
Routes.
Fuel stops.
Truck numbers.
On the night the electronics disappeared, Luis recorded a dispatch
change at 11:42 p.m.
AUTHORIZED BY A. RUSSO.
He also wrote another name.
M. CALLAHAN PRESENT.
Ethan stared.
Michael Callahan.
His father.
Rachel looked at him.
“You said your father blamed mine.”
“He did.”
“But he was there.”
“Yes.”
The notebook did not explain why.
Then they played the cassette.
Luis’s voice crackled through an old recorder.
“If anything happens to me, Michael knows Anthony changed that truck.”
May you like
Ethan closed his eyes.
His father had known Luis was innocent.
