Chapter 12 - WHAT WADE WANTED FOR THE TRUTH
Wade’s request remained unanswered for nine days.
During that time, investigators recovered the records broker’s server, Highline notified affected applicants, and the court prohibited Meridian from using any audio derived from Lydia’s childhood case.
Wade sent no second request.
That mattered to Lydia.
“He used to keep asking until silence became a problem someone else had to solve,” she said.
She eventually agreed to a recorded interview with attorneys present. She watched from another room and submitted questions through Rachel.
Wade sat beneath institutional lighting.
He did not call her sweetheart.
He did not ask whether she remembered him.
“The handwritten agreement is inside the old Bison Peak office,” he said. “Patricia hid it behind the furnace-service panel.”
“Why there?” the prosecutor asked.
“Because no real technician entered that building after we began forging reports.”
The sentence was both explanation and confession.
“What does it say?”
“Crane agreed to close the Redstone sale even if Cassidy became medically unavailable. I agreed to deliver her trust signature or a successor proxy.”
“Did medically unavailable mean injured?”
Wade closed his eyes.
“It meant unable to stop the closing.”
“Did Crane tell you to hurt Cassidy?”
“No.”
“Did he know you had threatened her?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I sent him one of our arguments.”
The recording had never been found.
Wade said he recorded Cassidy secretly to prove she was irrational. Instead, the audio captured him threatening to take Lydia if she blocked the sale.
Crane replied:
Domestic pressure is not our department. Obtain authority before eight.
“Why reveal this now?” the prosecutor asked.
“Because Crane used Lydia’s interview.”
“You used Lydia’s fear first.”
“Yes.”
“What do you want?”
Wade looked toward the camera.
“I want the truth recorded before he says I invented everything alone.”
The answer did not make him noble.
It made his motive usable.
Lydia sent one question.
Did you give him my voice?
Wade’s face changed when the prosecutor read it.
“No.”
A pause.
“I gave Redstone access to the family-litigation folder during the sale.”
That folder contained school records, trust documents, custody drafts, and recordings Wade believed might help establish control if Cassidy resisted.
Lydia’s voice had entered Crane’s reach because Wade treated his family’s private history as transaction material.
The Bison Peak office was searched under warrant.
Behind the furnace panel, investigators found a waterproof envelope containing the handwritten agreement, Wade’s secret recording, and a small ledger.
The agreement matched his description.
The ledger listed payments from Redstone affiliates to Bison Peak after the sale collapsed. Crane had funded legal defenses, data storage, and the purchase of Wade’s disputed options.
The final page contained two future dates.
LYDIA — 18
GRACE — 18
Beside each name was the same instruction.
OBTAIN BEFORE SHE UNDERSTANDS VALUE.
Lydia stopped the playback when Rachel reached that line.
“He thinks understanding value means understanding money.”
“What does it mean to you?” I asked.
“That my answer belongs to me before I know what it is worth to him.”
Grace reached for her hand.
Lydia allowed it.
The next morning, Northern Beacon’s remote system sent a false all-clear to North Basin while a physical sensor detected rising carbon monoxide.
May you like
The independent alarm sounded.
Six hundred workers began evacuating into a Montana blizzard.
