Chapter 7 - The Web UnravelsMark Reynolds sat trembling in the leather chair, his face grey and sweat-beaded.
“It wasn't my idea!” Mark stammered, looking frantically between Vance’s gun and me. “It was Clara! My sister! She needed the money to cover her gambling debts in Atlanta! She convinced Evan that Sarah was going to write him out of the will!”
“Shut up, Uncle Mark,” Evan said quietly, his voice completely dead of emotion. “Just shut up.”
Vance pulled a set of steel handcuffs from his tactical belt and snapped them tightly around Mark Reynolds’ wrists, securing him to the heavy iron frame of the bookshelf. He then picked up Mark’s dropped revolver and secured it in his pocket.
“The flash drive in that box,” Vance said, turning to me, “contains full audio recordings of Richard’s conversations with the state prosecutor before he died, as well as the forensic chemical analysis of his blood work.”
I held the small silver drive in my hand, looking down at Evan. He looked tiny, broken, sitting in the corner of the room he had just tried to destroy.
“Why didn't Richard go to the police back then?” I asked softly. “Why didn't he stop this three years ago?”
“Because he wanted to protect his son,” Vance replied softly. “Evan was fourteen when Mark started manipulating him. Richard knew that if he went to the authorities then, Evan would be charged as an accessory to attempted murder. Richard spent his final months trying to build a legal trap that would lock away Mark and Clara while giving Evan a chance to turn his life around once he realized the truth.”
Vance looked at his watch. “State police units and federal agents are forty minutes away. I called them from the fire road. They’re executing arrest warrants for Clara Reynolds in Atlanta as we speak.”
Suddenly, the front door of the cabin slammed open with a violent bang.
Drafts of freezing wind and rain rushed down the hallway.
May you like
A woman stood in the entrance, her raincoat dripping wet, holding a heavy double-barreled shotgun leveled directly at Vance’s back.
It was Clara Reynolds—Evan’s mother.
Related Stories
