The young lady disappears before her engagement—and the carpenter is the only one who knows where she is…
A salty Atlantic breeze blew across the perfectly manicured lawns of The Gilded Cage in the Hamptons. Today was supposed to be the biggest day in the Sterling family’s history: the engagement of their only daughter, Elena Sterling, to Preston Vance, the heir to the Vance Capital investment firm.
The party had everything: flowing Cristal champagne, imported caviar, and the most powerful guests on the East Coast. But it was missing one thing: the bride.
The clock struck 7 p.m. Elena had not yet appeared.
The tension in the mahogany-paneled library was as tense as a frayed string. Elena’s father, Arthur Sterling, paced back and forth, his glass of Scotch trembling in his hand. Preston Vance, the groom, sat in a leather chair, his face anxious but his eyes cold, constantly checking his Patek Philippe.
“She can’t just disappear!” Arthur roared. “The best security system in America!”
The library door swung open. The local sheriff walked in, followed by two FBI agents (called in by Arthur through connections).
“Mr. Sterling,” the sheriff said, his face solemn. “We found a clue.”
He placed an evidence bag on the table. Inside were a bloody handkerchief and a red-handled wood chisel.
“We found this on Elena’s balcony. And the security camera on the back porch was disabled around the time she disappeared.”
Preston jumped to his feet, pointing at the wood chisel. “I know this! It’s the carpenter’s! Jack!”
Arthur was stunned. “Jack? Jack Miller?”
“Yes!” Preston shouted, playing the part of the grieving husband perfectly. “He’s been hanging around Elena for the past two months while we’re renovating this library. I’ve seen the way he looks at her. He’s a ragged bastard, jealous of our wealth. He kidnapped her!”
“Kidnapped?” Arthur paled.
“For blackmail, or worse…” Preston trailed off, sending terror into his father’s mind. “Father-in-law, I warned you. Don’t let such lowlifes get close to Elena. He’s not a good match. He hates us.”
“Find her!” Arthur slammed his hand on the table, ordering the police. “Turn the state of New York upside down! Find that carpenter and bring my daughter back!”
While the mansion was in chaos, Preston turned away, hiding a smirk. He pulled out his phone, texting a brief message: “Plan B. Take care of both of them.”
Fifty miles away, in an abandoned hunting cabin deep in the dense woods of the Catskill Mountains.
Elena Sterling was huddled in an old wooden chair, holding a cup of hot water. She wasn’t tied up. She wasn’t gagged. But she was shaking with fear.
Across from her was Jack Miller. He didn’t look like a kidnapper. He wore a flannel shirt with tattered edges, jeans stained with sawdust, and a handsome but worried face. He was frantically checking the windows and loading an old shotgun.
“Jack…” Elena whispered. “Why did you bring me here? Your father will kill me. They’ll think I kidnapped you.”
Jack turned, looking at her with a firm but gentle gaze. “I know, Elena. But if I leave you in that mansion another hour, you’ll die.”
“Dead? What do you mean? Preston loves you…”
“Preston doesn’t love you,” Jack interrupted, his voice hard. He pulled a small tablet from his pocket—the device he used to control the smarthome system he was installing in the mansion. “Preston wants your life insurance and inheritance. He’s in debt from gambling and bad investments.”
Jack opened a video file.
“Look. This is a security camera in the library that I secretly installed to monitor the construction progress. Preston doesn’t know about it.”
Elena took the tablet. The screen showed a scene from two days ago.
In the library, Preston was talking to a strange man—a tall, scarred man dressed in black.
Preston (in video): “The night of the engagement. When the fireworks went off. I want it to look like an accident. She fell off the balcony and onto the cliff. Got it?”
Scarface: “$5 million. Transfer half of it upfront.”
Preston: “Okay. Just make sure she’s dead. I need that inheritance to shut up the Russian mafia.”
Elena dropped the tablet. She covered her mouth, tears welling up in her eyes. The man she was about to marry, the man her family forced her to marry because of “social status”, was the one who hired a hitman to kill her on the night of their engagement.
“This afternoon, I saw that Scarface guy mixed in with the service team,” Jack said, his voice urgent. “I didn’t have time to call the police. Preston has a lot of connections, he’ll cover it up before the police get there. I had no choice but to… take you away.”
“So… the bloody handkerchief?”
“Your blood,” Jack held up his bandaged hand. “I broke the glass door to get into your room because Preston changed the code on the electronic lock. I left the chisel on purpose. I wanted them to think I kidnapped you.”
“Why?” Elena was surprised.
“Because if they think I was kidnapped for ransom, the police will get involved, the media will get involved.
Preston won’t dare to kill you right away because he’s afraid of being discovered. He’s forced to play the role of a worried husband. It’s the only way to buy us time.”
Jack Miller, a poor carpenter, agreed to turn himself into America’s most wanted criminal just to save the life of the girl he secretly loved.
But Jack underestimated Preston’s cruelty. He didn’t wait for the police.
Crack.
The sound of dry branches breaking echoed outside the cabin.
Jack immediately turned off the lights. He signaled Elena to lie down on the floor.
“They’re here,” he whispered, tightening his grip on the shotgun. “He put a GPS on your phone before I could throw it away.”
Outside the cabin, the night was pitch black. The scarred assassin, named Kael, was quietly approaching with two accomplices. Preston had paid extra: “Kill them both. “Make it look like a kidnapping for ransom went wrong, the kidnapper killed the hostage and then himself.”
Jack knew he couldn’t hold out long with a double-barreled shotgun against professional silencers. He needed a crazy plan.
“Elena,” Jack whispered in the darkness. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” she said, squeezing his hand.
“There’s an old tunnel in the cellar under the floor that leads to the creek. Go down there and run. Run as far as the highway, flag down any cars, and call the Sheriff.”
“And you?”
“I’ll stay and hold them off. I’ll make noise to distract them.”
“No! I’m not going without you!”
“Go! This is your only chance to expose Preston. As long as you survive and give the police that video, I’ll be cleared. If we both die here, Preston wins.”
Jack pushed Elena under the hatch. He kissed her forehead. “Go!”
Jack closed the hatch, pulled the heavy table over it. He took a deep breath, loaded his gun. He wasn’t a soldier, he was a carpenter. But he knew the structure of this house better than anyone – he’d rebuilt it himself.
The front door was kicked open.
Three dark figures rushed in.
Bang!
Jack fired the first shot into the ceiling, bringing a large wooden beam crashing down on the head of the leader.
“I’m here, you bastards!” he yelled, dashing through the side window, leading them into the woods.
Jack ran for his life through the dark woods. Branches whipped at his face, thorns tore at his flesh. He could hear bullets whistling past his ears.
He wasn’t running randomly. He was leading them to “Carpenter’s Trap” – the old logging area with its pulleys and cables that he was familiar with.
But He was exhausted. A bullet grazed his calf and he fell to his knees.
Kael stepped forward, his gun pointed at his head.
“It’s over, carpenter. Where’s the girl?”
“She ran,” Jack sneered, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. “You’re too late.”
“I’ll find her after I blow your brains out,” Kael coolly put his finger on the trigger.
Beep… Beep…
A siren wailed. Not one car. Dozens.
Red and blue headlights swept through the woods like spotlights. A loudspeaker blared:
“POLICE HERE! PUT DOWN YOUR GUN! YOU’RE SURROUNDED!
Kael was stunned. He turned around.
Behind him, there were more than just the police.
Arthur Sterling was standing there, with the Sheriff and… Elena beside him.
It turned out that Elena hadn’t run to the highway. She had only run to Jack’s pickup truck hidden near the stream, where the emergency radio was. She had contacted the police channel, and more importantly, she had sent the video from her tablet directly to her father’s email as soon as she had a signal.
Arthur Sterling had seen the video. He had seen the true face of his future son-in-law. And he had mobilized the helicopter force to get here as fast as possible.
“Put down the gun!” Arthur roared, not holding a glass of wine this time, but holding a pistol of his own. “Don’t you dare touch my daughter’s benefactor!”
Kael knew he had no way back. He was about to shoot himself to death.
But Jack, taking advantage of the moment In that moment of distraction, he swung his chisel—which he always kept hidden in his boots—and stabbed the assassin in the leg.
Kael fell, his gun flying away. SWAT officers immediately swooped in to subdue him.
Two hours later. At the local police station.
Preston Vance was handcuffed and dragged out of his Rolls-Royce in the lobby of the Sterling mansion. He screamed and threatened to sue the police department. But when Arthur threw a tablet in his face, showing him the video of him hiring a hitman, Preston fell silent. He collapsed like a sandcastle in the tide.
In the infirmary, Jack was getting his leg bandaged.
The door opened. Arthur Sterling walked in, with Elena.
The powerful, arrogant Arthur Sterling now looked ten years older, but the way he looked at Jack was different. No longer contempt. Only shame and respect.
“Mr. Miller,” Arthur said, his voice hoarse. “I… I owe you an apology. And a life.”
“You don’t owe me anything,” Jack replied, wincing in pain. “I did it for Elena. Not for you, or for your fortune.”
Elena rushed forward, hugging Jack, sobbing into his shoulder. “You’re a
Stupid. I almost died for you.”
“That’s what carpenters do,” Jack chuckled, stroking her hair. “Fixing what’s wrong and protecting what’s precious.”
Arthur stood there, watching his daughter happy in the arms of the poor carpenter. He realized his blindness to “equal status” had nearly killed her. He watched Preston being led through the glass door—a billionaire with a rotten soul. And he looked at Jack—a carpenter with calloused hands but a heart of gold.
“Mr. Jack,” Arthur cleared his throat. “The library… it’s not finished yet. Would you mind… going back to finish it? As… um… family?”
Jack looked at Elena. She smiled, nodded.
“I’ll charge you for overtime, sir,” Jack joked.
“Double,” Arthur insisted. “And you don’t need to use the back door anymore. The front door is always open for you.”
The Sterling-Vance scandal shook the nation. Preston Vance was sentenced to life in prison. The Vance Group collapsed.
But in the Hamptons, people were talking about a different story. The story of the carpenter who kidnapped the young lady not to extort money, but to steal her from death.
A year later, in the same garden, another wedding took place. No extravagance, no Cristal champagne, just craft beer and a BBQ.
Jack Miller, in a simple tailored suit, waited for Elena to walk down the aisle. This time, no one called him “the carpenter.”
They called him a hero.
And that red-handled chisel? It hung proudly in the Sterling library, a permanent reminder that: A man’s worth is not in the size of his bank account, but in the size of his hands when he holds them out to protect the one he loves.
