Chapter 4 - Trust No One

I slammed the phone down so hard the plastic cracked.

The bank manager was the man Monica had been having an affair with for years.

They had orchestrated this entire nightmare together.

They planned to steal my husband's lucrative apple hybrid, force me into foreclosure, and take the land.

I knew I could not trust the local police if the bank was already corrupted.

I packed a small bag with clothes, snacks, and the metal lockbox.

I strapped my confused children into the backseat of my car.

We needed to drive to the city and find a lawyer outside of this corrupt small town.

I turned the ignition key, but the engine simply sputtered and died.

I tried again, but the car was completely dead.

I got out and popped the hood to see what was wrong.

Every single spark plug wire had been cleanly sliced in half.

I slammed the hood shut in sheer frustration.

We were trapped on the property with no working vehicle.

I ran back inside the house and locked the deadbolts again.

I needed to find out why Daniel's apple trees were so valuable to them.

I climbed the pull-down stairs into the dusty attic to search through Daniel's old gardening journals.

I found his leather notebook hidden beneath a pile of winter coats.

I flipped through the pages until I found a heavily circled entry.

Daniel had successfully bred an apple that was completely immune to the devastating blight destroying commercial orchards.

His patent was worth millions of dollars to the agricultural industry.

And he had hidden the original seeds somewhere on our property.

I heard the loud crunch of tires on the gravel driveway outside.

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I looked out the attic window and saw a black van blocking my driveway.

Four men in dark suits stepped out, and Monica was standing right beside them.