Chapter 12 - TWENTY-FOUR HOURS
The timer changed everything.
Twenty-three hours.
Fifty-nine minutes.
Fifty seconds.
Marcus stared at the screen.
His mother was alive.
His wife was in danger.
His child might be delivered at any moment.
And somewhere, Charles Thorne believed that made Marcus weak enough to control.
Khloe watched Marcus carefully.
“Don’t sign anything.”
Marcus turned.
“That’s my mother.”
“And this is our child.”
“I know.”
“No.”
Khloe’s voice sharpened.
“You know emotionally.”
“I need you to know legally.”
Marcus stared at her.
“If you sign that waiver, we give him what he planned all of this to get.”
“And if I don’t, he kills her.”
Khloe’s expression softened.
“I didn’t say do nothing.”
Adrian stepped closer.
“She’s right.”
Marcus looked at him.
“We use the deadline.”
“How?”
“They expect panic.”
Adrian pointed toward the video.
“They expect you to isolate.”
“They expect you to make one desperate decision.”
Khloe nodded.
“So we do the opposite.”
Detective Brooks agreed.
“We widen the investigation.”
Marcus laughed bitterly.
“In twenty-four hours?”
“Yes.”
Brooks’s voice remained calm.
“Because whoever sent that live feed made a mistake.”
“What?”
“They made it live.”
Adrian understood.
“A live feed can be traced.”
Brooks nodded.
“Not easily.”
“But possible.”
Marcus looked toward the timer.
“Then trace it.”
Technicians began immediately.
The stream bounced through servers in Canada, Iceland, Singapore, and Switzerland.
Each layer added time.
Time they did not have.
Khloe’s doctor entered.
He looked at the monitor.
Then at her.
“You’re having more contractions.”
Khloe closed her eyes.
“How frequent?”
“Ten minutes.”
Marcus stared.
“She’s in labor?”
“Possibly early labor.”
Khloe touched her stomach.
“Can you stop it?”
“We can try to slow it.”
“But with the placental issue, we balance risk.”
Marcus looked toward the timer again.
Charles needed the waiver before the birth.
The baby seemed determined not to cooperate.
That created a new possibility.
“What happens if the baby is born before I sign?”
Damian still remained on speakerphone.
He answered.
“The trust vests automatically.”
Marcus looked toward Khloe.
“And the waiver becomes useless.”
“Yes.”
Khloe gave a short, humorless laugh.
“So Charles has the same deadline the baby does.”
Marcus understood.
“If Khloe delivers first, he loses.”
Damian answered.
“Financially, yes.”
Khloe looked at the phone.
“Then he will try to stop the delivery.”
The room went silent.
Everyone realized she was right.
Brooks immediately called hospital security.
“No nonessential personnel on this floor.”
“Lock elevators.”
“Check food deliveries.”
“Check ventilation access.”
Marcus looked toward Adrian.
“Can someone shut down the operating rooms remotely?”
Adrian shook his head.
“Not fully.”
“Can they cut power?”
“Backup generators activate.”
“What can they do?”
Adrian’s face tightened.
“Create chaos.”
Khloe whispered.
“That’s enough.”
At 10:34 a.m., Thomas Reed arrived under police escort.
Marcus almost refused to see him.
Khloe insisted.
“He knows the trust.”
Thomas entered slowly.
He looked at the live image of Evelyn.
His face broke.
“Evelyn.”
Marcus watched him.
“You loved her.”
Thomas did not answer.
That was answer enough.
Khloe noticed too.
“You weren’t just her lawyer.”
Thomas closed his eyes.
“No.”
Marcus stared.
“What were you?”
Thomas looked at him.
“Her mistake.”
The words stunned him.
Thomas sat.
“After your father died, Evelyn and I became close.”
Marcus’s expression hardened.
“How close?”
Thomas met his eyes.
“Too close.”
Marcus looked away.
Khloe waited.
Thomas continued.
“We were never public.”
“She was terrified of scandal.”
“Of the board.”
“Of Damian.”
Marcus laughed bitterly.
“Everyone was terrified of Damian.”
Thomas looked toward the phone.
“Not like that.”
Damian’s voice came from the speaker.
“Careful, Thomas.”
Thomas looked at it.
“There he is.”
Marcus frowned.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Thomas looked toward Khloe.
Then Marcus.
“Damian wasn’t Evelyn’s greatest fear.”
“Then who was?”
Thomas answered.
“Charles’s father.”
Marcus frowned.
“My uncle?”
“Yes.”
“Robert Thorne.”
Marcus remembered him vaguely.
A hard man.
A distant man.
Killed in a boating accident when Marcus was a teenager.
Thomas continued.
“Robert believed your father had cheated him out of control.”
“He spent years gathering evidence against the family.”
“When he died, Charles inherited everything.”
“Documents.”
“Recordings.”
“Financial records.”
Khloe frowned.
“So Charles grew up believing Marcus’s branch stole from his.”
“Yes.”
Marcus looked at Damian.
“You knew this?”
Damian answered.
“Parts.”
Thomas continued.
“Evelyn altered the succession trust because Charles threatened to expose illegal transfers made by your father.”
Marcus stared.
“My father committed fraud?”
Thomas nodded.
“Years before you were old enough to understand.”
Marcus looked sick.
Khloe asked.
“And the custody directive?”
Thomas closed his eyes.
“That was Evelyn’s worst mistake.”
“What happened?”
“She created it when Marcus was twenty-five.”
“Why?”
“She was afraid Marcus would marry someone Charles could manipulate.”
Khloe laughed bitterly.
“Comforting.”
Thomas looked ashamed.
“Evelyn trusted blood more than outsiders.”
“So she named Charles guardian?”
“At the time, she still believed he could be reconciled.”
“Then he disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t she revoke it?”
Thomas looked at Marcus.
“She tried.”
“What do you mean tried?”
“The directive was filed in a private family jurisdiction in Switzerland.”
“Revocation required Charles’s acknowledgment because he was named party.”
Marcus stared.
“That makes no sense.”
“It was designed for old dynastic trusts.”
“It is archaic.”
“But potentially enforceable enough to create a custody fight.”
Khloe’s hand tightened.
“A fight is all he needs.”
Thomas nodded.
“He doesn’t need to win permanently.”
“He needs possession.”
Marcus whispered.
“Of my child.”
“Yes.”
The monitor beeped.
Khloe closed her eyes as another contraction tightened across her abdomen.
Marcus moved closer.
The contraction passed.
Khloe opened her eyes.
“Maybe possession is the wrong goal.”
Thomas frowned.
“What?”
Khloe looked toward him.
“If the trust vests at birth, who controls the assets until the child becomes an adult?”
Thomas answered.
“Legal guardian and designated trustees.”
Khloe stared.
“So Charles doesn’t want the baby because of family.”
“No.”
Her expression hardened.
“He wants the baby because the baby is a key.”
Thomas nodded slowly.
“To twenty-eight billion dollars.”
Marcus looked ready to tear apart the room.
Khloe touched his hand.
“Anger later.”
“We need proof now.”
At noon, technicians traced one layer of the stream to a private satellite uplink registered to a logistics company.
Damian recognized the name.
“Northstar Transit.”
Marcus looked toward the phone.
“You know it?”
“Charles used it years ago.”
Brooks immediately searched.
Northstar owned warehouses.
Storage facilities.
Private ambulance contracts.
Medical transport vehicles.
Adrian looked up sharply.
“Medical transport.”
Khloe understood.
“They can move Evelyn without airports.”
Brooks nodded.
“And possibly move Isabella.”
At 1:20 p.m., police identified a Northstar vehicle captured near Isabella’s building.
A black medical van.
At 1:44, they found the van.
Empty.
At 2:03, a fingerprint came back.
Isabella’s.
At 2:18, another fingerprint came back.
Evelyn’s.
Marcus sat down.
It was the first physical proof his mother had been alive recently.
He stared at the report.
“Where did the van go before they found it?”
Brooks opened a map.
“Three stops.”
“Queens warehouse.”
“Private airfield in New Jersey.”
“And a closed rehabilitation center north of the city.”
Thomas looked up.
“What rehabilitation center?”
Brooks read the name.
“St. Catherine’s Behavioral Recovery.”
Thomas went white.
Khloe noticed.
“You know it.”
Thomas nodded.
“My firm represented it.”
Marcus stared.
“Owned by who?”
Thomas looked at him.
“Evelyn’s foundation.”
The room changed.
Brooks immediately mobilized a team.
Marcus stood.
“I’m going.”
Khloe said no.
He turned.
“My mother may be there.”
“And your child may be born here.”
Marcus’s face broke.
Khloe forced herself to stay steady.
“This is what Charles wants.”
“He wants you choosing between us every ten minutes.”
“Stop choosing.”
Marcus stared.
“How?”
“Stay where you are most useful.”
“And where is that?”
Khloe squeezed his hand.
“Here.”
Adrian left with Brooks.
Thomas remained under guard.
Damian began coordinating corporate records remotely.
For the first time, people who distrusted each other were working toward the same thing.
Charles had built his plan on division.
Khloe began to believe that might be his weakness.
At 4:11 p.m., the police team entered St. Catherine’s.
No Evelyn.
No Isabella.
But they found a room with restraints.
Medical supplies.
A camera.
And one recent meal still warm.
Someone had left less than an hour earlier.
Then officers found something scratched into the underside of a wooden table.
E.T.
Three numbers.
7-4-9.
Brooks sent the image to Marcus.
He stared.
“What does 749 mean?”
Thomas looked over his shoulder.
His face changed.
“No.”
Marcus turned.
“What?”
Thomas stood.
“We need to get Khloe out of this hospital.”
Marcus stared.
“Why?”
Thomas pointed at the numbers.
“That isn’t a location.”
“What is it?”
Thomas’s voice shook.
“It’s an old Thorne emergency code.”
Khloe looked toward him.
“For what?”
Thomas whispered.
“Facility compromised.”
Marcus’s stomach dropped.
Then every light in Khloe’s room went out.
The fetal monitor died.
May you like
The hallway alarms began screaming.
And somewhere below them, the hospital’s backup generators failed to start.
