Chapter 17 - THE UNEXPECTED ALLY
By daylight, Daniel knew they were running out of road. His truck’s license plates would be flagged on every automated reader within two states. Credit cards were useless. Cell phones were tracking beacons. He was an ordinary man fighting a multi-million-dollar syndicate embedded in the highest corridors of power.
He needed leverage. And there was only one person alive who hated Sterling more than Daniel did.
He drove deep into the industrial district of Newark, stopping before a run-down legal clinic tucked between a scrap metal yard and an auto body shop. Inside sat Marcus Vance—Daniel's estranged uncle, a disbarred federal prosecutor who had spent the last decade drinking away the memory of how Sterling’s machine had ruined his career.
Marcus stood behind the scarred wooden desk, his hair unkempt, smelling of cheap bourbon and stale cigarettes. When he saw Daniel holding Lily in his arms, his cynical expression melted into grim understanding.
"You brought her here," Marcus whispered, quickly locking the reinforced steel door behind them. "Daniel, you have any idea what you've walked into? Sterling’s private security firm has half the Eastern seaboard locked down looking for you."
"I have the offshore wire transfers, Marcus. And I have the names carved in the basement boxes."
Marcus froze. The color drained from his weathered face. "The boxes? She saw the boxes?"
"She knows where the bodies are buried. Literally," Daniel snarled, setting Lily down in a safe corner with a drawing pad. "You used to be the fiercest prosecutor in this state. Help me take them down, or give me a rifle and get out of my way."
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Marcus stared at the little girl, who was silently sketching a large oak tree with a tall man beside it. A muscle twitched in the old lawyer’s jaw. Slowly, he opened the bottom drawer of his desk, pulling out a battered laptop that had no network connection, completely air-gapped from the internet.
"I won't give you a rifle, Daniel," Marcus said, his voice regaining an edge of steel. "I'll give you something much deadlier. Sterling has a vault under his private residence in Greenwich. That's where the master recordings are kept. If we get those tapes, Sterling won't just fall—the whole house of cards collapses."
