He Bought 1,200 Acres With Water Rights — The City Had Been Using His Spring
Chapter 6
The next morning, Luke found the gate open.
He had locked it himself.
Nothing appeared missing.
Then he noticed the cabin.
The door stood slightly ajar.
Inside, drawers had been pulled out.
Files were scattered across the floor.
His father’s old toolbox had been overturned.
Luke went cold.
Ava arrived ten minutes later.
“We need to call the sheriff.”
“Already did.”
She looked around.
“Did they take anything?”
Luke scanned the room.
“Maybe.”
“What?”
“My father’s notebook.”
Ava frowned.
“What was in it?”
“I don’t know.”
She looked at him.
“Then someone does.”
The sheriff’s deputy arrived and took photographs.
There were no broken locks.
No fingerprints worth using.
Whoever entered knew exactly where to look.
That evening, Luke searched every room again.
He found nothing.
Then he remembered his father’s habit.
Whenever something mattered, Daniel Mercer hid it in places no one thought to search.
Luke checked the old furnace.
Nothing.
The attic.
Nothing.
The barn.
Nothing.
Finally, he went to the farmhouse kitchen.
His father had kept an old coffee grinder on the counter for thirty years.
Luke picked it up.
Something rattled underneath.
He unscrewed the base.
A tiny memory card fell into his palm.
Luke stared.
They found a computer that could read it.
There were only seven files.
Six were photographs.
The seventh was a video.
Luke clicked it.
His father’s face appeared on the screen.
Older.
Tired.
Standing near Spring Creek.
“If you’re watching this,” Daniel said, “then you found the card.”
Luke stopped breathing.
His father continued.
“The city isn’t stealing water because they need more water.”
Luke leaned closer.
“They’re stealing it because they need the aquifer under the spring to remain classified as municipal property.”
Ava’s eyes widened.
Daniel continued.
“There’s an old state designation attached to the aquifer. If the true boundaries become known, the city can’t build its eastern expansion.”
The video flickered.
“That’s where the money is.”
Luke whispered, “The housing project.”
His father nodded on screen.
“Richard Hale and his partners have spent years acquiring land around the proposed development corridor.”
Ava looked at Luke.
Daniel continued.
“They intend to move the water rights into a private utility company once development begins.”
Luke’s fists tightened.
“And the spring?”
“If they control the spring, they control the entire corridor.”
The video paused.
Then Daniel spoke one final sentence.
“There’s only one thing they didn’t know.”
Luke leaned forward.
“The original aquifer boundary was never destroyed.”
The screen went black.
Ava whispered, “Where is it?”
Luke stared at the blank monitor.
“I don’t know.”
Then he noticed the memory card had one hidden folder.
He opened it.
There was a scanned photograph.
An old county courthouse hallway.
On the wall behind his father was a framed survey map.
At the bottom corner was a handwritten number.
County Archive: Shelf 14 — Box 73.
Luke stood.
“We’re going to the courthouse.”
Ava grabbed her coat.
“What if someone already found it?”
Luke looked at her.
“Then we find out who.”
As they stepped outside, a gunshot cracked through the night.
The farmhouse window shattered beside Luke’s head.
Ava grabbed him.
“Down!”
They dropped behind the porch railing.
Another shot tore into the barn wall.
Luke looked toward the darkness.
Someone wanted the evidence destroyed.
And now they wanted him dead.
