Chapter 2 - The Secret My Father Buried Inside Ken Voss
I did not sleep that night.
How could I?
I had spent years believing my father was a grieving businessman who died in an accidental fire.
Now I was sitting in the study of Chicago's most feared criminal, looking at evidence suggesting my father's life had been something entirely different.
Ken gave me the bedroom at the end of the hall.
I didn't use it.
Instead, I sat beside the window wrapped in a blanket, staring at the city.
At 2:17 a.m., there was a knock.
"Come in."
Ken opened the door.
He was no longer wearing his suit jacket.
His sleeves were rolled to his forearms.
It should not have mattered.
It did.
"You're still awake."
"So are you."
"I have work."
"You mean secrets."
His mouth tightened.
"Fair."
He entered and placed a cup of tea on the table.
I looked at it suspiciously.
"You made tea?"
"I know how."
"That's weirdly disappointing."
A tiny smile appeared.
"Sleep deprived people are usually less sarcastic."
"I'm making an effort."
He sat across from me.
For a moment neither of us spoke.
Then I asked the question I had been avoiding.
"Did my father work for you?"
"No."
"Did he work with you?"
"Yes."
"Crime?"
Ken looked directly at me.
"Sometimes."
I laughed once, without humor.
"That is a convenient answer."
"He helped me dismantle a network."
"What network?"
"The one that is looking for you now."
My smile disappeared.
Ken continued.
"Twenty-four years ago, Chicago had three major crime organizations. My father ran one. Victor Hale ran another."
"And mine?"
"Your father worked between them."
"Doing what?"
"He moved money."
I stared.
"Money?"
"Legitimate money, dirty money, political donations, shell companies."
He leaned forward.
"But Daniel Whitlock was different."
"How?"
"He kept records."
My skin prickled.
"What records?"
"Everything."
Ken opened a drawer.
He removed a small photograph.
On the back was a handwritten note.
Daniel kept copies.
My father had always been organized.
Bills.
Tax forms.
Receipts.
My mother used to joke that he saved supermarket coupons from ten years ago because he hated wasting anything.
Now I wondered whether all those boxes in our basement had contained something else.
"Where are his records?"
Ken shook his head.
"Nobody knows."
"Then why are they watching me?"
"Because they think he told you."
"But he didn't."
"Maybe he did."
I frowned.
"What?"
Ken stared at me.
"Maybe he knew one day they would come for you."
I thought about my childhood.
The basement.
The locked cabinet.
My father's insistence that I never touch his office desk.
The night before he died, he had taken me outside.
He had knelt beside me.
"Whatever happens, don't trust anyone who asks about the blue room."
I had never understood.
The blue room.
There had been no blue room.
At least not in our house.
I told Ken.
He became completely still.
"Say that again."
"The blue room."
"Your father said those exact words?"
"Yes."
Ken stood.
"Reeve."
The door opened instantly.
"Boss?"
"Call the architect."
Reeve looked confused.
"Which one?"
"The Whitlock house."
My heart jumped.
"You still have the house?"
Ken looked at me.
"No."
"Then how—"
"I bought it."
I stared.
"You bought my childhood home?"
"After it went up for auction."
"Why?"
"Because I thought someone would search it."
"Did you find anything?"
"No."
"Then why keep it?"
Ken's answer was quiet.
"Because I never stopped looking."
We drove there before sunrise.
The house looked smaller than I remembered.
The brick exterior had faded.
The front garden was overgrown.
I touched the porch railing.
Memories came back in fragments.
My mother's laugh.
My father's shoes by the door.
My bedroom.
The kitchen table.
The blue bicycle I had stolen from a neighbor because mine broke.
Ken stood behind me.
"You okay?"
"No."
"Good answer."
We entered.
Dust covered everything.
Reeve and two men searched room by room.
I walked toward the basement.
At the bottom of the stairs was an old door.
I stopped.
"That's it."
Ken came beside me.
"What?"
"The blue room."
He looked at the door.
It was painted blue.
I had forgotten.
Inside was a child's bedroom.
Mine.
But there was something wrong.
The room was too empty.
My father's old desk was gone.
The wallpaper had been removed.
Only one thing remained.
A small wooden chest.
I approached it.
There was no lock.
Inside was a cassette tape.
And a photograph.
The photograph showed me at nine years old.
Standing beside my father.
Behind us was the very warehouse where he supposedly died.
My hands shook.
Ken saw something.
"What?"
I turned the photograph over.
A message was written there.
You were never supposed to survive.
The basement suddenly felt freezing.
Then we heard a noise upstairs.
Footsteps.
Ken immediately pulled me behind him.
Reeve drew his weapon.
The footsteps stopped.
Then glass shattered.
Gunfire.
Ken pushed me against the wall.
"Stay down."
Men rushed through the house.
Reeve returned fire.
I covered my ears.
My entire body shook.
Ken moved with terrifying calm.
He fired twice.
A scream.
Then silence.
"Are they gone?"
"For now."
He crouched beside me.
"Are you hurt?"
"No."
He touched my cheek.
It was only a second.
But his fingers were warm.
And his eyes were not those of the ruthless man everyone feared.
They were the eyes of a man who had just been afraid of losing me.
I looked at the cassette.
"Maybe my father recorded something."
Ken nodded.
"We'll listen."
We returned to his estate.
An old player was found.
The tape crackled.
Then my father's voice filled the room.
"Marin, if you're hearing this, something went wrong."
I stopped breathing.
"I couldn't trust the police."
A pause.
"I couldn't trust the courts."
Another.
"I couldn't even trust my own family."
Ken stared at the floor.
My father continued.
"Ken Voss knows the truth."
I turned.
Ken closed his eyes.
"If you meet him one day, understand this: he was never the enemy."
I stared at Ken.
My father kept speaking.
"He protected you before he even knew your name."
Then came the sentence that shattered everything.
"Marin, you're not my daughter."
The tape stopped.
The room went silent.
I couldn't breathe.
Ken didn't move.
I whispered:
"What?"
He looked at me.
May you like
"I was hoping you'd never have to hear that."
My entire world had just changed.
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