CHAPTER 4: CONFRONTATION AT HANGAR 4
The night air in Seattle was freezing, but sweat was pouring down my face as I drove my truck toward Boeing Field. Ryan was in the passenger seat, loading a high-capacity magazine into a concealed handgun he had retrieved from his car’s glove compartment. Thomas was in the back, wrapping a tight bandage around his bleeding torso.
“He won’t let any of us walk out of that hangar,” Ryan said quietly, his gaze fixed on the tarmac ahead. “He knows if any of us survive, his life is over.”
“He’s not hurting Emma,” I said, my voice dripping with lethal intent. “I don’t care about the company. I don’t care about the money. I don’t care about the past. He touches my daughter, and I will kill him with my bare hands.”
Thomas looked up from the back seat. “He expects us to give him the briefcase to trade for the kid. But the briefcase isn’t our leverage, Michael. I am.”
I looked at Thomas in the rearview mirror. “What do you mean?”
“Dad’s entire offshore network is tied to my legal identity,” Thomas explained, his dark eyes flashing with cold intelligence. “When he declared me dead in 1999, he opened those Panama accounts under my original social security number. He couldn’t use his own without triggering IRS flags. I spent the last five years in Central America hacking into those accounts. I don’t just have the proof of his crimes—I have the master encryption keys to his entire sixty-million-dollar fortune.”
I stared at him. “You can wipe him out.”
“In three keystrokes,” Thomas nodded. “He doesn’t care about the company anymore. He cares about his escape fund. If he doesn’t have those keys, he’s just an old man with a gun fleeing the FBI.”
Ten minutes later, we pulled up to the perimeter gate of Hangar 4 on the south end of the airfield.
The airport was quiet, illuminated by towering stadium lights. A private Gulfstream jet sat on the tarmac outside the open hangar doors, its engines idling with a low, vibrating whine.
We stepped out of the truck and walked toward the blinding light of the hangar.
Inside, standing near the wheel well of the jet, was my father. He was dressed in a pristine wool coat, holding a leather travel bag. Next to him stood Derek—Ryan’s former employee, who was actually my father’s hired enforcer—holding Emma by her arm.
Emma was sobbing quietly, her small frame trembling, but when she saw me, her eyes lit up. “Dad!”
“Emma! Stay still, sweetie!” I called out, taking a step forward.
Derek immediately pulled a handgun, pressing the barrel against the side of my daughter’s head. “One more step, Hayes, and she doesn’t make it to her thirteenth birthday.”
I froze, every nerve ending in my body screaming in agony.
My father stepped forward, his face expressionless. “Look at you three. The loyal son, the traitor, and the ghost. Standing together at last.”
“Let her go, Dad,” I said, keeping my voice as steady as humanly possible. “You have what you wanted. The company is destroyed. The secrets are out. Take the money and leave. Just let my daughter go.”
“I can’t do that, Michael,” my father said smoothly, reaching into his coat and pulling out a silver remote detonator. “Because as long as any of you are breathing, I will always be looking over my shoulder.”
Ryan’s eyes widened. “What is that?”
“The old warehouse wasn’t the only building rigged tonight,” my father replied with a chilling smile. “Hayes & Sons headquarters, the main equipment yard in Tukwila, and your house, Michael. All prepped with demolition charges. Once I’m in the air, I press this button. The evidence, the records, and your homes disappear. I become a ghost. Just like Thomas was.”
“You’re insane,” Ryan whispered. “You’re completely insane.”
“I am a businessman!” my father roared, his composure finally snapping, his eyes bulging with maniacal greed. “I built everything you have! Your clothes, your education, your nice houses, your fucking lives! Everything came from my mind! And you dared to try and steal it from me!”
“You didn’t build anything!” Thomas shouted, walking past me toward the center of the hangar. He held up a rugged military smartphone. “You stole it! And now, it’s gone!”
My father frowned. “What are you talking about?”
Thomas tapped the screen three times.
Across the hangar, my father’s satellite phone in his pocket began to chime wildly with automated notifications. He pulled it out, staring at the screen in horror. Account after account, shell company after shell company—the balances were dropping to zero in real-time as Thomas transferred the entire sixty million dollars into a secure escrow account managed by the Federal Reserve’s financial crimes division.
“What did you do?!” my father screamed, his face turning purple with rage. “WHAT DID YOU DO?!”
“I just bankrupted you, old man,” Thomas said, a dark smile spreading across his face. “You’re broke. You’re a fugitive. And the FBI has your location pinned right now.”
“Kill them!” my father shrieked at Derek. “KILL THEM ALL!”
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