The Sister Buried Without a Body
Chapter 02 - The Sister Buried Without a Body
Jack locked the bar doors.
His vice president, Amos Briggs, turned off the exterior lights. Rosa Martinez, the bartender and former combat medic, brought Ellie hot chocolate and a plate of fries.
Ellie ate as though she had not seen food all day.
Jack sat across from her.
“Tell me everything your mother said.”
Mara had raised Ellie in a rented farmhouse outside Cedar Ridge under the name Mara Cole. They moved often. Mara never discussed family and never allowed photographs online.
Three nights earlier, a black sheriff’s vehicle stopped near the farmhouse.
Mara gave Ellie the photograph, medal, and key.
“She told me to take the creek trail to the bus station if anyone came through the front door.”
“Did they?”
Ellie nodded.
She heard men shouting. One called Mara by her real name.
Ellie escaped through the root cellar and hid inside a produce truck headed toward Gray County. From there, she walked until she found the bar address written behind the photograph.
Jack looked at his sister’s face.
Eleven years earlier, Sheriff Vale told him Mara died when a mountain cabin burned during a winter storm. The remains were too damaged for identification. Jack had been recovering from a motorcycle crash in another state.
Vale handled the funeral.
The casket remained closed.
Amos placed a laptop on the table.
The sheriff’s press conference described Ellie as the daughter of a deceased drifter named Mara Cole. Vale claimed a witness saw Iron Wolves members near the farmhouse.
“That story was prepared before the girl arrived,” Amos said.
Jack turned the medal over.
A narrow seam ran around its edge.
Their father had used the medal to store emergency microfilm during the war.
Jack pressed the center.
The case opened.
Inside was a tiny memory card wrapped in wax paper.
Rosa inserted it into an offline computer.
One video file appeared.
Mara sat inside a parked car, speaking quietly.
“Jack, if Ellie reaches you, Vale found me.”
She explained that the cabin fire had been staged. Sheriff Vale helped her disappear after she discovered evidence against a county development company.
At first, she believed he saved her.
Then she learned he had arranged the fire.
The video ended with a warning:
“Do not trust anyone carrying our father’s second medal.”
Jack looked toward the club wall.
May you like
His father had owned only one medal.
Yet in an old photograph beside the bar mirror, Sheriff Vale wore an identical copy.
