Chapter 9 - Seventeen Minutes

Elena read the maintenance order three times. The timestamp showed 11:42 p.m. to 11:59 p.m. Marcus's car had been found downriver at 12:21 a.m. The accident reconstruction placed the crash somewhere in that seventeen-minute window.

"Does this prove Victor did it?" Owen asked.

"No," Elena said. "But it tells us where to look."

Detective Pierce brought the order to a forensic analyst. The cameras hadn't simply failed. They had received a scheduled remote shutdown command issued from the facilities network. Someone had used a supervisor login. That supervisor had been in surgery with his wife the entire night.

Victor's attorney went on television by lunchtime. He called Elena an unstable spouse desperate for attention, claimed the ballroom assault was self-defense, and hinted that she was under investigation for diverting charity funds. Clips of Elena walking away in red played on repeat, stripped of the blows that came before.

"They're editing you into the villain," Noah said when he saw the news.

"Then we keep the full record," Elena answered. "A clean timeline matters more than a loud lie."

The video recorded by a guest in blue went to Pierce. It clearly showed Victor attacking and Elena evading him. Dana warned Elena not to publish evidence during an active case. The footage might make the public angry; handled carefully, it could help make the facts stick.

That afternoon, Sofia Bell arrived at the legal-aid office with her mother. Sofia was thirty, sharp-eyed, wearing a sweatshirt that read MUSIC IS WORK. Her mother, Rosa, hugged a paper folder against her ribs.

"My mother cleaned rooms in that hotel for twelve years," Sofia said. "When I complained about the missing scholarship, they said she stole jewelry. A camera supposedly proved it. They never showed us."

Rosa pushed the folder forward. Inside was a letter from Marcus. He had been helping them appeal the termination before he died.

"He told me to look for an orange service van near the bridge," Rosa said. "He said it wasn't supposed to be there."

"Why orange?" Elena asked.

Rosa unfolded a printed photograph. The van's door carried a white star.

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The same star used by Northstar Civic Partners.

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