Chapter 5 - The War for Sophie
They barely made it back to the truck.
Ethan slammed his foot onto the gas pedal, the tires screeching against the wet pavement as the gray F-150 tore away from the curb just as a private security SUV rounded the corner with its bright beams flashing.
Inside the cab, both of them were breathing heavily, covered in rain and small scratches from the flying glass.
Claire looked over at Ethan, her hands shaking violently as she held the charter. “He’s going to come after Sophie, Ethan. You heard him. He knows her name.”
Ethan’s face was set like iron. “He won't touch her.”
“You don't know him!” Claire shouted, tears finally breaking through her sharp gray eyes. “Grant doesn't play by the rules! He buys judges, he hires investigators, he ruins lives for sport! He’s going to file a report with Child Protective Services by morning, claiming you brought your daughter into a criminal lifestyle!”
“Then we don't go back to the shop,” Ethan said, turning the truck down a dark side street away from the highway.
“Where do we go?”
“Somewhere he can't find us.”
Twenty minutes later, Ethan pulled into the hidden driveway of an old timber-frame barn located on the outskirts of Hilliard. It was a secondary workshop he owned—a place where he stored raw lumber and heavy machinery.
He called his sister, Sarah, who lived ten minutes away.
“Sarah,” Ethan said as soon as she answered. “I need you to go to the apartment right now. Use the fire escape key. Get Sophie, pack a bag for her, and bring her to the Hilliard barn. Do not answer your phone for anyone else. Do it now.”
Sarah didn't ask questions. She knew the tone in her brother’s voice.
An hour later, Sophie was sitting on an overturned crate inside the dim, sawdust-scented barn, wrapped in a blanket, drinking warm tea from a thermos.
She looked at her father, whose knuckles were bruised and bloodied, and then at Claire, whose high-end coat was torn and covered in mud.
“Are we on the run?” Sophie asked, her voice surprisingly calm.
“We’re taking a temporary detour,” Ethan said, kneeling down in front of her. “Sophie, I am so sorry I got us into this.”
Sophie reached out and touched her father’s bruised jaw gently. “Did you help her get what belonged to her?”
Ethan looked over at Claire, who was leaning against a stack of raw oak planks, looking small and defeated.
“Yes,” Ethan said.
“Then you did the right thing,” Sophie said simply. “That’s what you taught me.”
Claire covered her mouth with her hand, a single tear spilling over her cheek. She walked over to the small family, kneeling down beside Ethan.
“Sophie,” Claire said, her voice trembling. “I promise you, on my life, I will not let anything happen to your father or your home. I am going to end this tomorrow.”
“How?” Ethan asked, looking at her. “Grant controls the press, he controls the board, and now he has the police looking for us.”
May you like
Claire looked down at the red leather charter sitting on the workbench.
“He controls the board because he thinks I am fighting him in court,” Claire said, a cold, fierce light returning to her eyes. “He doesn't know I’m going to fight him in front of the entire world.”
