The Gate Keeper by Brent Jeffries

Author:Brent Jeffries [Jeffries, Brent]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-04-07T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Four

Even though the call with Marcia Stephenson was horribly painful and made me feel terrible for her, it also led me to believe Paul may have been onto something. I didn’t know if Filipov was the one ‘pulling the strings’ in Mark’s life, but Paul seemed to think he was. And Marcia’s version of Mark’s final months didn’t derail that possibility.

My next call was going to be Bart. After hearing about Mark, I was eager to find out if Bart was alive and doing ok. I knew he was in Tampa the last time I talked to him, so I started there. Like the research on Mark, I did a few searches for Bart’s contact details and eventually found a mobile number under his name. I wished I had access to all the search capability in Paul’s cabin for the task.

I sat back on the couch and took a deep breath, hoping the call with Bart didn’t go as bad as the previous one.

“Hello?” Bart answered the phone with a cautious question, which was odd. He was always the happy, outgoing one.

“Hey Bart, it’s Keith Morgan,” I said, trying to set the happy tone he usually initiated.

“Oh hey, Keith, what’s up? I haven’t heard from you in years, brother!” His voice brightened up a little, but still sounded strained.

“Yeah, I know, man. I’m sorry about that. I always promise myself I’ll do better, but life speeds on, you know,” I said.

“Don’t I know it,” he replied, still not the happy Bart I remembered.

“Hey listen, Bart. I’m following up with everyone from the old team based on some direction from Paul Frazier,” I said.

“How’s ol’ Paul doin’?” Bart asked, lightening up a little.

Unfortunately, I had to bring him back down with the answer.

“Well, I’m sorry to say Paul passed away about ten days ago. He was on a trip to Nashville and had to have some surgery that ended up being fatal,” I said, intentionally leaving out the details that would take too long to explain.

“Oh no. I’m really sorry about that, brother. He was a good man,” Bart replied, leaving the moment of cautious cheer behind.

“Yeah, he sure was. We’re all sorry, for sure. But the reason I called has to do with some research he was doing before he died. He has sort of handed it to me, and I feel I should continue looking into his ideas. From your response, I guess he hasn’t spoken to you?” I asked.

“No. No, he hasn’t. Why?” Bart asked.

“Paul was concerned there might be an outside party trying to manipulate the lives of our team members. I’m not sure if it was possible or not, but I’m curious if you’ve experienced anything that might feel like that?” I set him up to tell me the story that Paul had been tracking.

“You’ve got to be kidding me. Paul knew about this? YES! I have absolutely experienced this. I’m still in the middle of it,” he said.

Then he mumbled some things in the background.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.