Chapter 5 - The Last Good Engineer
"Everybody back from the door," Iris said.
The smoke smelled of hot plastic, not a building-wide blaze, but Iris had seen small things grow teeth. She pushed Marisol toward the stairwell and made Adrian call the fire department again, this time with the basement location.
"There's a second way in," Victor said. "Laundry crossover."
"Lead us," Iris answered.
They rounded the corner through a low corridor lined with humming pipes. A service hatch opened into the archive room's rear storage bay. Inside, Owen Bell crouched beside a metal cabinet, coughing into his elbow. His sleeve was scorched. A portable space heater had been shoved against a stack of cardboard boxes, its cord looped around a door handle. The boxes were smoking at the edges.
"Holt left it running," Owen rasped. "Wanted us thinking the wiring was bad again."
Adrian pulled the plug while Victor fetched a fire extinguisher. Iris helped Owen to his feet. She didn't let him turn back for his notes. They moved through the crossover and up the stairwell, stopping on a clear landing while dispatch confirmed firefighters were on the way.
"You called me," Iris told Owen. "Why?"
He stared at her face. "You have Rosa's eyes."
"Don't do that," she said. "Tell me what you found."
"In the old logs, the Saint Alder fire doors were ordered locked before the smoke even reached them. Your mother saw the crew working. She told me. I was scared, and I told her I'd make it right after my shift." His voice cracked. "I didn't."
Marisol pressed her hands to her mouth. Owen kept going because stopping would have been easier.
"I kept the duplicate shift cards in a wall clock. It was the only thing they never searched. Holt found out today. He's taking the clock to the loading bay for disposal."
"Who authorized the locks?" Adrian demanded.
Owen pointed toward the banquet floor. "The order came from the executive office. On a white work ticket. Signed by D. Mercer."
Adrian rocked back as if Owen had struck him. His father's initials. His father's hotel. Five dead workers.
"I saw the original," Owen said. "But signatures can lie. The time stamp can't. Someone used his authority after he left the country."
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A phone buzzed inside Adrian's jacket. Celeste had sent a photograph: the old wall clock sitting in the trunk of a black sedan.
Underneath she had typed, IF YOU WANT TO KEEP YOUR FATHER'S NAME, COME ALONE.
