Chapter 2 - The Flight

I didn’t sleep that night. I sat on my couch in the dark, my wife asleep upstairs, staring at the wall until the sun came up.

I had to know. If I didn't, this would eat me alive.

I knew Dad’s schedule by heart. On Tuesday mornings, he volunteered at the local food bank from 8:00 AM to noon. He never missed a shift. At 8:30 AM, I parked my car two blocks from his house and walked the rest of the way, feeling like a criminal in my own childhood neighborhood.

I let myself in using the spare key he kept under the ceramic frog on the porch. The house was dead quiet. The smell of stale coffee and cinnamon lingered in the air. The shattered mug from Sunday had been swept up, leaving the kitchen spotless.

I walked straight into the living room and stared at the massive, floor-to-ceiling brick fireplace. It hadn’t been lit in years. Dad always said the flue was broken and it was too expensive to fix.

I knelt on the hearth and turned on my phone’s flashlight. I began pressing against the bricks, starting from the bottom left.

Nothing.

I moved up a row. Pressing, pushing, knocking.

Solid.

I spent twenty minutes scouring the right side, my knees aching against the hard stone. I was about to give up, convincing myself I was losing my mind, when I pressed a soot-stained brick in the very back corner, just behind the iron grate.

There was a soft click.

The brick didn't push in; it slid sideways. My breath caught in my throat. I pried the brick out entirely, revealing a dark, rectangular cavity hidden within the masonry. I shined my light inside.

Sitting in the dust was a heavy, tarnished metal lockbox.

I reached in and pulled it out. It was shockingly heavy. The latch on the front featured a tiny, intricate keyhole. A keyhole perfectly shaped for an antique silver key.

But I didn't have the key. My grandmother’s letter said Dad knew where it was, but he had buried it.

I stared at the box, frustration boiling over. I wasn't going to leave without answers. I carried the lockbox out to the garage, clamped it into my dad's heavy-duty workbench vise, and grabbed his crowbar. With a sickening crunch of metal, I forced the lock open.

Inside the box were three things:

1. A thick stack of documents.

2. A pocket watch—my grandfather’s pocket watch, the one he supposedly had on him when he drowned.

3. A handwritten letter sealed in a plastic bag.

I opened the documents first. They were financial ledgers, but not the kind my dad usually handled. They were offshore accounts, wire transfers, and shell companies. Millions of dollars moving through dummy corporations.

Then, I unfolded the handwritten letter. It was my father’s handwriting, dated the night my grandfather disappeared.

“If someone finds this, I am already dead, or in prison. I didn’t kill him. I swear to God I didn’t. But I helped them hide it. I had to, or they were going to kill Sarah and Ethan.”

Suddenly, the front door unlocked.

“Ethan?” my dad’s voice echoed from the hallway. “Is someone here? I forgot my blood pressure meds…”