Chapter 15 - Ten Minutes
Emily ran toward the service corridor.
Ortiz caught her arm.
"If you charge upstairs, you give him control."
"My daughter is on that screen."
"And my agents are calling the hospital now."
"He has someone outside her room."
"Then we move the person, not the evidence."
Richard watched the hospital feed.
The man in scrubs stood motionless near Room 814.
Too motionless.
A real nurse hurried past him without acknowledgement.
Richard pointed.
"He's not hospital staff."
Ortiz spoke into her radio.
"Confirm Room 814, immediate extraction. Quietly."
Evan's voice returned.
"Nine minutes."
Malcolm dragged himself into a chair.
"He can see the radio traffic if he's in control-room mirrors."
Ortiz looked at him.
"How?"
"Hotel security has a police-band receiver. Richard insisted on it after a kidnapping threat twenty years ago."
Richard closed his eyes.
Another protection mechanism turned weapon.
"Can we cut the feeds?"
"Not without killing power to the entire building," Malcolm said.
"Do it."
"Backup generator restores control room in twenty seconds."
Emily pulled the cassette from her pocket.
"What if we give him what he wants?"
Richard looked at her.
"No."
Her expression sharpened.
"You just told me the drive wasn't worth my daughter."
"It isn't."
"Then why no?"
"Because giving it to him doesn't make her safe. It only makes us blind."
Emily hated that he was right.
Ortiz's earpiece crackled.
"Hospital security moving now."
On the ballroom screen, a guard approached the man in scrubs from behind.
The man glanced sideways.
Then ran.
He disappeared into a stairwell.
Claire opened Room 814 and pulled little Emily away from the doorway.
The feed flickered.
Evan cursed over the speakers.
"Eight minutes."
Richard frowned.
"He didn't change the deadline."
Emily looked at him.
"What?"
"If Emmy was the leverage, he would react to losing the man at the hospital. He didn't."
Malcolm's face changed.
"The hospital feed is prerecorded."
Ortiz checked the timestamp.
"Seven-minute delay."
Richard looked around the ballroom.
Evan had never depended on the hospital attack.
It was distraction.
"He wants us here."
A low mechanical hum began beneath the floor.
Malcolm tried to stand.
"Oh, God."
"What?"
"Ballroom fire doors."
Heavy steel shutters began descending over every exit.
Agents ran.
One door slammed shut before they reached it.
Another followed.
Ortiz fired at the control box.
Sparks burst, but the shutter continued downward.
They were sealed inside.
Evan's voice filled the room.
"Seven minutes."
Richard looked toward the ceiling.
"He's going to burn the ballroom."
Malcolm shook his head.
"No. Worse."
A sharp odor entered the room.
Not smoke.
Chemical.
Emily coughed.
Ortiz covered her mouth.
Malcolm pointed toward the decorative vents.
"Old fire-suppression system. Halon replacement. Evan modified it years ago for archive rooms. In high concentration it displaces oxygen."
Richard's chest tightened.
"He's going to suffocate us."
"And blame a system malfunction."
Emily looked at the stage clock.
Its digital display read 7:12.
Then 7:13.
The room seemed to contract.
"Seven-sixteen," she whispered.
Richard followed her gaze.
Margaret's warning.
The clocks.
The timestamp.
The melody.
Always 7:16.
Not only a clue.
A habit.
"Evan schedules actions at 7:16," Richard said.
Malcolm nodded slowly.
"Because that was the time of his first successful transfer. He called it his lucky minute."
The clock changed to 7:14.
Richard looked at the string quartet platform.
Under it was the old service hatch Malcolm had used.
"Where does that go?"
"Mechanical corridor."
"To the suppression system?"
Malcolm nodded.
Emily grabbed Richard's arm.
"Two minutes."
They pulled up the hatch.
A narrow ladder descended into darkness.
Richard looked at Emily.
"You first."
She climbed.
Ortiz followed.
Malcolm tried to move but collapsed.
Richard lifted him under one arm.
"You don't get to die before you testify."
Malcolm laughed weakly.
"Still sentimental."
The clock above the ballroom changed.
7:15.
The oxygen seemed thinner even before the system fully activated.
Richard could not tell whether that was chemistry or panic.
Emily could.
"Don't breathe fast," she said. "It'll make it worse."
"You say that like I can schedule it."
"Count. Four in, six out."
He tried.
The ballroom had always been one of his proudest rooms. He had personally approved the ceiling restoration, the acoustic panels, the concealed ventilation that preserved the old plasterwork.
Now every elegant choice felt like part of a trap.
Malcolm leaned against a table.
"The system was designed for archive fires, not crowds. Evan bypassed the occupancy interlock."
Ortiz looked at him.
"Who had access?"
"Security, engineering, me, Richard's office."
Richard gave him a cold look.
"My office again."
"Your credentials were the skeleton key."
"And nobody thought a skeleton key could open something dangerous?"
Malcolm met his eyes.
"You liked systems that never told you no."
Emily glanced between them.
"That might be the most honest thing either of you has said about this company."
The clock changed again.
7:14.
Ortiz tested the nearest shutter with both hands.
It did not move.
"We need another exit."
Richard looked at the service hatch and realized the entire night had kept offering the same lesson in different rooms.
The official doors were the ones people controlled.
The hidden doors were the ones that saved them.
Ortiz pressed her sleeve over her nose and looked toward the ceiling vents.
"We need to keep talking," she said. "If anyone gets confused, says something strange, or stops responding, say it immediately."
Malcolm gave a weak laugh.
"Define strange."
"Tonight? Impossible."
Even Richard smiled for half a second.
Emily counted her breathing again.
Four in.
Six out.
She imagined her daughter doing the same exercise at the hospital, not knowing that her mother was trapped under a ballroom with a man trying to turn air into a weapon.
The thought almost broke her rhythm.
Richard noticed.
"Gold button," he said quietly.
Emily looked at him.
He had heard her in the boathouse.
She touched the gold button on her coat and resumed counting.
Gas hissed louder through the vents.
Richard dragged Malcolm toward the hatch.
The clock clicked.
May you like
7:16.
And somewhere below them, Evan began to applaud.
