Chapter 14 - The Night of the Blackout.
Adrian called Hannah before Priya finished speaking.
No signal.
He called the guest wing landline.
Nothing.
He called the Internal Affairs officer stationed outside Ethan's room.
Straight to voicemail.
His body reacted before his mind did.
He was already moving toward his car when Chen caught his arm.
"You are not driving like this."
"My son is there."
"And we are going there."
"Now."
"Yes."
She pointed to an unmarked police SUV.
Adrian got inside.
The forty-minute drive became twenty-seven with emergency clearance.
Adrian spent every second imagining walls.
Secret doors.
Dark corridors.
Ethan calling for Hannah again.
He hated himself for leaving even though staying at Holloway had made sense at the time.
Reason did little against a father's panic.
At Vale House, the entire east side of the estate was dark.
Emergency lights glowed in the front hall.
Officers moved through the grounds.
A portable command vehicle had arrived outside the gates.
Adrian jumped out before the SUV fully stopped.
Chen followed.
"Status!"
An officer met them.
"Power loss at 8:51. Backup generator failed to engage. Estate network went down simultaneously."
"Guest wing?"
"Cleared except for two missing persons."
Adrian already knew.
"Ethan and Hannah."
The officer nodded.
Adrian felt something inside him become ice.
"Where were the guards?"
"One was found unconscious near the service stair. No serious injury. The second officer is missing."
Chen's expression sharpened.
"Name."
"Officer Nolan Price."
Chen swore under her breath.
"Voss recruited him."
Adrian looked at her.
"You know that?"
"Price worked directly under Voss before transferring to Internal Affairs support last year."
The conspiracy had reached into the protection detail.
Again.
Adrian wanted to scream.
Instead, he looked at the dark house.
"Ethan knows the passages."
Chen understood.
"So does Hannah."
"Maybe they ran."
"Maybe."
They entered the guest wing.
The hallway was empty.
Ethan's bedroom door stood open.
The bed was unmade.
Franklin the stuffed fox lay on the floor.
Adrian picked it up.
His hands shook.
A glass of water had spilled beside the nightstand.
There was no sign of a struggle.
Hannah's room was also empty.
Her shoes were gone.
So was her phone.
Adrian noticed something on the mirror.
A word written in soap.
UP.
Chen stared at it.
"Hannah?"
"Maybe Ethan."
Adrian remembered Ethan's hiding place for the memory card.
Where grown-ups never look.
Up.
They searched the ceiling vents.
Nothing.
Then Adrian saw the attic access panel in the hallway.
It was slightly open.
A tactical officer climbed first.
"Clear."
Adrian followed despite Chen's protest.
The attic was low and filled with insulation, old trunks, and maintenance cables.
A faint line of flashlight glow appeared near the far beam.
Adrian moved toward it.
"Ethan?"
Silence.
Then a whisper.
"Dad?"
Adrian nearly collapsed with relief.
He moved around a stack of old boxes.
Hannah sat against a roof beam with Ethan tucked beside her.
She held a small emergency flashlight.
Ethan's face was pale, but he was unharmed.
Adrian dropped to his knees.
"I'm here."
Ethan launched himself into Adrian's arms.
Adrian held him so tightly the flashlight rolled away.
"You came back."
"Every time."
Hannah exhaled and leaned her head against the beam.
Adrian looked at her.
"What happened?"
"The lights went out."
"Then?"
"Officer Price knocked on the door and said there was a fire alarm."
Chen climbed into the attic behind them.
"There was no fire alarm."
"I know."
Hannah's voice was tight.
"He tried to take Ethan toward the service stairs."
Adrian felt rage rise.
"You stopped him?"
"Ethan did."
Everyone looked at the boy.
Ethan buried his face against Adrian.
Hannah explained.
"Ethan recognized Price's voice."
"From where?"
"The blue-door garage."
Ethan whispered.
"He was there with Captain Voss."
Hannah continued.
"Ethan said no. Price reached for him. I pulled Ethan into my room and locked the door."
"How did you get out?"
"The attic access is inside the linen closet."
Adrian almost laughed from relief and disbelief.
The old house had finally hidden someone for the right reason.
"Where is Price now?"
Chen spoke into her radio.
Officers were searching the grounds.
Hannah looked at Adrian.
"He wasn't alone."
Adrian went still.
"Who else?"
"I heard someone in the service corridor."
"Grant?"
"No."
Ethan lifted his head.
"Celeste."
Adrian stared.
"Celeste was under guard."
Chen's face changed.
She radioed immediately.
The response came back within seconds.
Celeste was still in the secured west suite.
Two officers confirmed visual contact.
Ethan shook his head.
"I heard her."
Hannah nodded.
"So did I."
Adrian looked at Chen.
"Recording?"
"Maybe."
The house contained speakers in multiple service areas from an old intercom system.
Someone with network access could have played Celeste's voice.
Why?
To make Ethan afraid.
To steer him.
Grant still understood fear better than doors.
They brought Ethan and Hannah down through the attic.
The backup generator remained disabled.
Priya arrived and found the control module had been remotely locked.
The attack was both physical and digital.
Officer Price was found thirty minutes later near the east gate.
He had changed into a maintenance jacket and tried to leave through the grounds.
He was arrested.
His phone contained instructions from Captain Voss.
CUT POWER.
MOVE BOY TO SOUTH PASSAGE.
DO NOT HURT HIM.
WAIT FOR G.S.
Adrian read the messages.
Grant had not wanted Ethan harmed.
At least not yet.
He wanted him moved.
The next message explained why.
BOY FOR FATHER. FATHER FOR LEDGER.
Adrian looked at Chen.
"He wants a trade."
"He wants the black ledger."
"Then he knows we found it."
Priya answered.
"Someone at Holloway told him."
They reviewed every person who had been on scene.
Firefighters.
Police.
Federal agents.
Evidence technicians.
Felix.
Too many possibilities.
Then Adrian remembered something.
"Kessler."
Ellis looked at him.
"He's in custody."
"His lawyer?"
The room became quiet.
Kessler's lawyer worked for Sloane and Pierce LLP.
Even with Grant missing, the firm still functioned.
Information could move through privileged conversations and intermediaries.
Chen immediately requested a review of lawful communication boundaries.
Adrian looked at Ethan.
"You're not staying here tonight."
Ethan did not argue.
"Where?"
"Somewhere with no secret passages."
Hannah almost smiled.
They moved to a secure federal residence outside the city.
It was small by Adrian's standards.
Three bedrooms.
A plain kitchen.
A fenced yard.
No marble.
No staff.
No hidden corridors.
Ethan loved it.
He chose the smallest bedroom because it had a window facing a maple tree.
Hannah made grilled cheese sandwiches.
Adrian burned the first batch.
Ethan laughed.
The sound nearly broke Adrian in the best possible way.
For one hour, there were no detectives in the kitchen.
No board members.
No lawyers.
Just a father, a son, and the woman who had listened through a wall.
Then Adrian's secure phone rang.
Unknown number.
Chen, sitting in the living room, immediately signaled for him to answer on speaker.
Adrian did.
"Hello."
Grant Sloane's voice came through.
"I'm glad Ethan is safe."
Adrian's entire body tightened.
"You don't get to say his name."
Grant ignored him.
"You found my archive."
"Your archive is evidence now."
"Some of it."
Adrian looked at Chen.
She was recording.
"What do you want?"
Grant laughed softly.
"You know what I want."
"The ledger."
"The original."
"Why?"
"Because dead men wrote things they should not have written."
Adrian understood.
The black ledger did not only expose Grant.
It exposed decades of Vale family corruption under Adrian's grandfather.
If public, it could damage the family name, company history, and institutions connected to it.
Grant assumed Adrian would protect the Vale legacy.
That was one of Adrian's pressure points.
"You still think I care more about the family name than my son."
Grant paused.
"Everyone cares about something."
"You taught me that."
"Then you understand the problem."
Adrian's voice became cold.
"No. You misunderstand mine."
"Do I?"
"The Vale name can survive the truth."
Grant's tone hardened for the first time.
"Can it survive prison sentences, destroyed foundations, political investigations, and shareholder lawsuits?"
"We'll find out."
Silence.
Grant had expected shame.
Adrian gave him none.
Then Grant changed tactics.
"Ask Hannah what happened to Mara."
Hannah froze at the kitchen doorway.
Adrian looked at her.
"What did you say?"
Grant continued.
"Ask her why her sister stopped calling."
Hannah stepped closer to the phone.
"Where is Mara?"
Grant laughed softly.
"Still listening through doors, Hannah?"
Her face went pale.
"Where is my sister?"
"Bring me the ledger and perhaps you can ask her yourself."
The call ended.
Hannah stared at the phone.
Adrian looked at Chen.
"He has Mara."
Chen's expression was grim.
"Or he wants us to believe he does."
Hannah's voice shook.
"Either way, he knows where she is."
Ethan stood in the hallway, having heard enough.
He looked at Hannah.
"We have to find her."
Adrian looked at his son.
The child who had just escaped a hidden room was worried about someone he had never met because she mattered to Hannah.
Grant believed fear isolated people.
Maybe that would be his mistake.
At the safe house after the blackout, Ethan refused to sleep until every window latch had been checked twice.
Adrian checked them once.
Ethan checked them again.
Then Hannah checked the hallway.
Only after that did the boy climb into bed.
Adrian sat beside him.
"Do you want the light on?"
"A little."
Adrian left the bathroom light glowing through the open door.
Ethan looked toward the ceiling.
"Is there an attic?"
"Yes."
His body tensed.
Adrian immediately added.
"But there is no access from this room, and officers checked it."
Ethan relaxed slightly.
"Okay."
Adrian waited.
"Dad?"
"Yeah?"
"When the lights went out, Hannah didn't say everything was fine."
"What did she say?"
"She said she didn't know what happened, but we were going to move somewhere safer."
Adrian nodded.
"That sounds like Hannah."
"Celeste always said everything was fine."
The distinction cut deeply.
Reassurance without truth had become suspicious to Ethan.
Adrian chose his next words carefully.
"I won't always know if everything is fine."
Ethan looked at him.
"I know."
"But I will tell you what I do know."
"Okay."
"And if I don't know, I'll say that too."
Ethan nodded.
A minute later, his eyes closed.
May you like
Adrian remained beside the bed until his breathing became steady.
For once, staying in the room felt more important than solving what happened outside it.
