Robert Hayes, Circle H Ranch.Single-vehicle accident on Route 47. No witnesses. Hayes went off the road on a curve, rolling multiple times. Alcohol was not a factor. Brake failure, no evidence of foul play. Investigation closed as accidental.
Robert Hayes was Emma’s dad.
I grip the report. I knew his accident was sketchy three months ago. I’d even taken this report to Jake Callahan and hinted that I believed the Turners were responsible for Mr. Hayes’s death, because two days before he died, I heard him tell my dad he had evidence against the Turners.
My dad brushed him off.
I know the Turners had a hand in his accident. Does that mean the Turners are involved in all these cases?
You’d have to be naïve to think they aren’t.
My hands shake as I arrange all the files, spreading them across the desk. The pattern is undeniable. Property owner has legal or financial trouble and then personal tragedy. Then Clearwater Holdings swoops in and buys the land.
Every. Single. Time.
Except with Emma. Emma didn’t sell her property, though I know the Turners were pressuring her. She came in to file a complaint about Eli Turner harassing her, but my dad turned her away.
Of course, Eli disappeared shortly after that—Jake Callahan’s doing, I believe. But then her ranch house burned down—arson, no clues who set the fire. Which is why I told Jake that I wouldn’t look his way if something happened to Cole too. At the time, I was thinking to protect Emma.
Now I wonder if I need to protect my dad too.
My phone buzzes in my hand, and I nearly drop it, it startles me so badly. It’s loud in the still room, and I rush to silence it.
Bennett
You good, sunshine?
I stare at the screen, my heart pounding.
Stop calling me that.
Bennett
Never.
You didn’t answer me.
And I'm not going to—not right now—because I'm not good and I can't tell him that, because if I do, I'll have to tell him my dad signed off on all these cases. I just set the phone down and go back to the files.
I need to make copies of them. I need to figure out what to do.
I pull out my phone and start photographing each file—every page, every signature, every detail. The camera shutter sound is muted but still feels deafening in the silence. My hands are shaking so badly I have to retake several shots.
MacKenzie.Click.
Hale.Click.
Ortega.Click.
Pritchard.Click.
Valencia.Click.
Hayes.Click.
When I'm done, I have dozens of photos documenting a pattern of corruption that spans five years. A systematic operation to acquire land through intimidation, violence, and murder—all with my father's signature blessing it at every step.
I carefully return the files to their boxes and slide them back onto the shelves exactly where I found them. I let myself out of the evidence room and go to the front desk to find one of those maps we keep around for lost tourists who haven’t discovered the internet yet.