Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 119597 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 598(@200wpm)___ 478(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119597 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 598(@200wpm)___ 478(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
Violent tremors shake me, crumbling my entire world.
“How is this possible?” I whisper. “He’s dead. My brother is dead.”
Memories flood back, a torrent of pain and shame and rage. So much fucking rage.
“Your brother?” Alvis widens his eyes before blinking rapidly. “I don’t know about that. But Denver is the man who’s been coming here. If he’s your brother, you need to find out what happened to him.”
I don’t believe him. I don’t believe any of this.
“What does he look like?” Panic flutters in my chest.
“I have a photo.” Sirena reaches into her purse.
“No.” I point at her, keeping my eyes on Alvis. “Describe him.”
Please, don’t say it. Please, don’t say it.
“Well, he looks nothing like you.” He rubs his balding head. “I mean, he’s a handsome fellow like you. But without all the fancy clothes. He reminds me of that one guy.”
A cold knot forms in my stomach.
“He was in that one movie. What was the name of it? Fight something or other. Oh, what was that actor’s name?” He glances around, looking at us for help. Then pauses. Snaps his fingers. “Brad Pitt.”
Bile surges in my chest and burns the back of my throat. Sickening waves of nausea slam into me so hard that I double over in pain, stumbling against the workbench, fighting for air.
“Monty?” Sirena hooks an arm around my back and touches a cold hand to my brow. “Are you okay?”
I send her stumbling backward with just a look. Then I aim that furious glare at Alvis. “Where does he live? Where is Denver?”
“I don’t know.”
“Fuck!” I swing an arm across the workbench, knocking tools and manuals to the floor. “If you’re protecting him—”
“I’m going to ask you to leave now.” Alvis inches backward, holding up his hands.
“Alvis, you can’t protect him. He’s a bad man. A fucking monster.”
“I’ve known him for thirty years. Been working for him for twenty. He’s been nothing but nice to me.” His face turns a deep shade of red, heat radiating from his skin. “He never lost his temper like you just did.”
“No. He wouldn’t.” I scrape a trembling hand over my mouth, fighting the urge to puke. “He’s a psychopath.”
“Now, I don’t believe that.”
“Did he tell you he had a brother? What about Rurik Strakh? Did you know he was Denver’s father?”
“No. I figured there was some relation with Rurik, same last name and all.”
“What about passengers? Does anyone fly with him?”
“Never. He’s always alone. He lives alone.”
In an off-grid safe house, self-sustained by a hydroelectric generator, that my father must’ve funded and built for him.
If Denver’s alive, he knows I orchestrated his murder.
He knows everything.
A cold sweat beads on my forehead.
He would’ve come for me or…
Frankie.
No. Oh, God, no. I can’t let my mind go there.
“Are you sure he was alone?” I seethe past clenched teeth. “Think carefully. Could he hide someone on board? Stuff a body in the cargo hold inside a box or a bag?”
“No, I…” His brows knit. “I don’t believe he’s capable of that. He’s a gentle man, always so charming and polite.”
“See this girl?” I hold up Kaya’s photo, my voice breaking. “He molested her when she was eight years old. And she’s not the only one. He hurts women. Children. Swear to God, Alvis, if you don’t tell me how to find him right fucking now—”
“I don’t know!” The blood drains from his face, leaving him visibly shaken. “He never told me where he lives. It’s up north somewhere.”
“North where?”
“Give me a minute.” He steps to the workbench and braces a hand on the surface. His other hand removes a handkerchief from his pocket and blots his sweat-slick face. “I think he said it’s three hundred miles northeast to his homestead, but he hauls logs in that plane twice a year. He must be farther than that, north of the arctic tree line. At least four hundred miles. But depending on the payload, that Beaver has a six-hundred-mile range.”
He could be anywhere in the North Slope Borough or Yukon, Canada. It’s such a vast, barren landscape with so many places to hide.
But it’s a starting point.
Sirena waits nearby, clutching her phone to her chest, lips parted, eyes round, seemingly in shock.
“Sirena.” My voice makes her jump. “Call it in.”
“On it.” She steps outside, lifting her phone to her ear.
The moment she alerts the authorities, this will hit the media stations.
Richest family in Alaska hides pedophilia crimes for thirty years.
Statewide search for brother of billionaire business mogul Monty Novak. Considered dangerous.
It’ll make national news.
It’ll ruin me.
I don’t fucking care.
Thirty years ago, when I discovered what Denver was, I wanted him incarcerated. At age eighteen, he would’ve been tried as an adult and put away for the rest of his miserable life.
But my father fought me, told me our family wouldn’t survive the media attention. His enemies would find us and slaughter us all.