Chapter 5 - A Door That Wouldn't Stay Closed
I tried to pull out my IV. Elias caught my hand before I could hurt myself.
"If you go now," he said, "you'll fall before you reach the elevator."
"That's my little brother."
"I can see that. I'm not leaving him there."
He forwarded the photograph to Ortiz despite his father's demand. It was the first useful thing he'd done without being asked, and I hated how badly I needed to trust him.
Ortiz studied the image. "There are concrete seams behind the chair and a faded orange triangle on the wall. Looks industrial. We can work with it."
Elias pointed to the corner. "That triangle was used at our old pumping stations. Orange meant emergency access."
"How many old stations?" she asked.
"Nine. But two are demolished."
Ortiz left to call her team. Elias found a bottle of water and stayed until my hands stopped shaking.
"My dad can't have done this," he said finally, but the sentence sounded like a question.
"Then someone has his phone."
He checked the number again. "No. That's him."
By sunrise, the hospital assigned an officer to my room. Mara arrived twenty minutes later carrying yellow flowers and an expression of wounded kindness. She stopped when she saw the officer.
"Harper, I came to apologize," she said softly.
"For which part?" I asked. "The wine or the man you sent to hurt me?"
Elias stepped out of the bathroom. Mara's eyes followed his face, trying to measure the damage.
"Elias, sweetheart, she's confused. The doctor said—"
"The doctor didn't speak to you."
Mara lowered her flowers. "You've known her three months. You've known me four years."
"I know the woman who warned me before I drank," he said. "I'm still working out the rest."
A flash of anger crossed her face. She hid it behind tears.
"Your father called an emergency board meeting," she whispered. "He's asking them to suspend you. Says you've been manipulated by an employee with a criminal record."
"I have no criminal record," I said.
Mara took a folded clipping from her bag and laid it on my bed. It was an old newspaper article about the flood. Someone had added a fresh headline in red marker:
DAUGHTER OF DEAD ENGINEER ADMITS FRAUD.
At the bottom was a signature copied almost perfectly from mine.
"Interesting," Elias said. "Nobody outside this room was supposed to know her real name."
May you like
Mara turned toward the door.
For the first time, he locked it before she could leave.
