Chapter 5 - Eleven Minutes
Grant didn't defend himself.
“I made a mistake,” he told Rose.
“Nora tried to tell me you needed help, and I didn't listen carefully enough. That was my mistake. Not yours.”
Rose watched him, as though mistakes belonged only to children.
“Are you in trouble?”
“I have things to fix.”
She considered that.
“Nora can help.”
“If she wants to.”
He looked at Nora and understood that an apology wouldn't buy back trust.
Not hers.
Not his daughter's.
Detective Ruiz met him downstairs that evening.
The hotel had preserved its security recordings at her request.
Staff were being interviewed.
Vanessa had given a statement through an attorney.
“She says Rose followed her through the service doorway and fell,” Ruiz said.
“She says she secured the door because she was afraid other people would crowd the child.”
Grant felt heat climb his neck.
“She called it a tantrum.”
“I have your account.”
“And she had the key.”
“I have that, too.”
Ruiz's calm wasn't indifference.
He forced himself to remember that.
The hotel's manager joined them with a printed timeline drawn from corridor footage.
Rose entered the bridal suite at 11:06.
Grant arrived at 11:17.
Eleven minutes.
“Did anyone call for help before I got there?” Grant asked.
“No emergency call from the suite,” Ruiz said.
“A florist asked an employee to check on a child, shortly before you arrived. We're following up.”
Grant pictured eleven minutes in a board meeting.
Nothing.
Barely enough time to get through introductions.
Then he pictured Rose on a cold floor, waiting for an adult to decide she mattered.
“Who was the florist?”
“Celia Brooks. Let us speak to her first.”
He nodded.
Every part of him wanted to run somewhere, accuse someone, force the truth out faster.
Instead, he went upstairs.
Rose needed him more than his anger did.
Leah met him outside the room holding a tablet.
“The wedding photographer sent the pictures you asked for. Just the ones with Rose.”
He nearly told her to delete them.
Then he saw the first photograph.
Rose stood outside the bridal suite, holding the bouquet against her chest.
Her lips were moving.
May you like
Leah touched the screen.
“It's a short video. Listen to what she's practicing.”
