CHAPTER 1 - THREE MINUTES IN THE RAIN
CHAPTER 1 - THREE MINUTES IN THE RAIN
Russell arrived in two minutes and forty-six seconds.
I knew because I watched the numbers change on the emergency clock above the elevator while rainwater gathered beneath my bare feet.
The elevator doors opened without a sound.
Russell Kane stepped into the hallway wearing a charcoal overcoat over his black suit.
He had been my father’s head of security for twelve years.
He was also one of the few people alive who had known where I was during my seven-year experiment.
His eyes moved from my wet dress to the red mark across my cheek.
Something changed in his face.
It was not shock.
Russell had seen enough cruelty in his career to stop being shocked by it.
It was calculation.
“Did he do that?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Do you need a doctor?”
“No.”
He removed his coat and placed it around my shoulders.
Behind the penthouse door, music began playing.
Victor had turned it up deliberately.
He wanted me to hear that his evening continued without me.
Then Camille Rowan laughed.
Her voice passed through the door like broken glass.
“Is she still out there?”
Victor answered loudly enough for me to hear.
“She’ll leave when she understands I’m serious.”
Russell looked at the door.
His jaw tightened once.
“Would you like me to speak with him?”
“No.”
That answer seemed to surprise him.
I looked at the gold numbers mounted beside the penthouse entrance.
For three years, Victor had told everyone that he had chosen the apartment because it reflected his success.
He had never known the building belonged to a Hartwell residential trust.
He had never known his rent was routed through an executive housing program my father had approved.
He had never known the furniture, the artwork, and even the wine he served Camille had been paid for by the empire he mocked me for not contributing to.
“I don’t want anger,” I said.
Russell turned back to me.
“What do you want?”
“The truth.”
He gave a small nod.
“That can be arranged.”
The elevator carried us down forty-three floors.
In the lobby, the night doorman stared at my bare feet and swollen cheek.
He hurried toward me.
“Mrs. Hayes, are you all right?”
Before I could answer, the penthouse intercom rang at his desk.
Victor’s voice came through the speaker.
“Do not let her back upstairs.”
The doorman looked at Russell.
Russell removed a black leather wallet and placed a card on the desk.
The doorman read it.
His face lost its color.
Russell spoke quietly.
“Mr. Victor Hayes is no longer authorized to issue instructions concerning Hartwell Tower.”
The doorman looked from the card to me.
“Ms. Hartwell?”
I had not heard anyone call me that in seven years.
I expected the name to feel foreign.
Instead, it felt like a door opening.
“Yes,” I said.
Outside, a black sedan waited at the curb.
The moment I entered, Russell handed me a tablet.
A live security feed showed the penthouse living room.
Victor stood beside the windows with a drink in his hand.
Camille wore my silk robe.
She was walking through my home as though she had already inherited it.
Then she stopped beside Victor’s desk.
She opened a drawer.
She removed a blue folder I had never seen before.
Victor turned sharply.
“What are you doing?”
Camille smiled.
“Making sure you kept your side of the deal.”
My anger vanished.
In its place came something colder.
“What deal?” I whispered.
Russell paused the video.
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
I shook my head.
He restarted the recording.
Camille opened the folder and removed architectural plans bearing the Meridian BuildWorks seal.
Across the top was the name of a confidential Hartwell redevelopment project worth more than eight hundred million dollars.
Victor had never been authorized to take those plans home.
Camille photographed every page.
Then she placed the folder into her handbag.
Russell looked at me.
“Your marriage may not be the only thing Mr. Hayes betrayed tonight.”
The sedan pulled beneath the covered entrance of Hartwell House.
My father was waiting at the top of the steps.
Arthur Hartwell did not run.
He did not shout.
He simply walked through the rain, took my face gently between his hands, and examined the mark Victor had left.
For one terrible second, I saw pain in my father’s eyes.
Then the fortress returned.
He looked at Russell.
“Freeze Victor Hayes’s corporate access.”
Russell nodded.
“Already initiated.”
“Lock the Meridian accounts connected to his department.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Alert internal investigations.”
Russell hesitated.
“And the penthouse?”
My father looked at me.
The decision belonged to me.
I thought of Victor standing inside with Camille.
I thought of the folder in her bag.
I thought of seven years spent waiting for character to reveal itself.
“Let them stay until morning,” I said.
My father’s eyes narrowed.
“Why?”
“Because I want to know who they call when they realize the doors are closing.”
At 12:17 a.m., Victor made his first call.
It was not to Camille’s driver.
It was not to his mother.
It was not to an attorney.
He called Daniel Cross.
The chief operating officer of Hartwell Group.
May you like
My father’s oldest friend.
And the man who had attended every one of my childhood birthday parties.
