CHAPTER 7 — THE COLLAPSE
The east wing folded inward like wet cardboard.
A cloud of concrete dust rose above the canyon.
Victoria screamed her son’s name, but Grant had already ended the call.
Ruiz called emergency services.
“How many workers are inside?”
Victoria grabbed a tablet.
“Night crew. Maybe thirty.”
Emily was already running.
“Where are you going?” Ruiz shouted.
“To the hospital.”
“It could collapse again!”
“My brother is on that crew.”
Ruiz caught her near the front door.
“You never mentioned a brother.”
“Ethan Carter. Electrical contractor.”
Marcus’s face went pale.
“Anna had another child?”
“My mother remarried. Ethan’s twenty-three.”
Emily pulled free.
“I’m not leaving him under there.”
They raced across the canyon in two vehicles. Fire engines arrived from the opposite direction.
The hospital site was chaos.
Workers stumbled through dust. Metal beams groaned overhead. A security guard shouted that several people were trapped in the underground loading level.
Emily found Ethan’s truck.
Empty.
His phone lay shattered beside the driver’s door.
“Ethan!”
No answer.
A foreman grabbed her.
“You can’t go in!”
“My brother’s inside.”
“The stairwell collapsed.”
Emily remembered the blueprints.
“There’s a utility tunnel beneath the west parking structure.”
The foreman blinked.
“How do you know?”
“I organized the foundation groundbreaking. I reviewed every emergency route.”
Ruiz pointed to two firefighters.
“Go with her.”
Marcus followed despite Emily’s glare.
“I’m not asking permission.”
They entered through a narrow concrete passage. Dust filled their mouths. Emergency lights blinked red.
They found three workers trapped behind a fallen beam.
Emily heard coughing farther in.
“Ethan!”
A weak voice answered.
“Em?”
She crawled through broken drywall and found her brother pinned beneath a steel support.
His face was bleeding.
“Don’t move.”
He laughed weakly.
“Wasn’t planning on it.”
Marcus knelt beside him.
“We need leverage.”
Together they lifted the support enough for a firefighter to pull Ethan free.
Then Emily noticed plastic explosives attached to a nearby column.
“This wasn’t a structural failure.”
Ruiz examined the wiring.
“It was a controlled demolition.”
A timer blinked.
Forty-three seconds.
“Everybody out!”
The tunnel shook as they dragged Ethan toward the exit.
Marcus slipped.
A concrete slab crashed down between him and Emily.
“Marcus!”
“Go!”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“You already lost one parent because of me.”
He pushed the bracelet through a gap beneath the slab.
“Don’t lose your brother too.”
The timer reached fifteen seconds.
Emily took the bracelet.
Ruiz pulled her away.
They reached the parking structure as the second explosion tore through the tunnel.
The ground rose beneath them.
Glass and concrete blasted into the night.
Emily hit the pavement.
For several seconds, she heard nothing.
Then sound returned in pieces.
Sirens.
People shouting.
Ethan calling her name.
Emily turned toward the collapsed tunnel.
Marcus was gone.
She tried to stand, but Ruiz held her back.
“You can’t go in.”
“He’s alive.”
“You don’t know that.”
Emily clutched the bracelet.
Her phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
Grant’s voice was calm.
“You chose the hospital instead of Sophie.”
Emily looked toward the smoke.
“What did you do to Marcus?”
Grant laughed.
“I didn’t do anything. But if he survived, he knows where to find me.”
Emily’s blood ran cold.
“Where?”
“The place your mother died.”
Then Sophie screamed in the background.
May you like
A gunshot followed.
And the call went dead.
