Chapter 8 - THE CHOICE VICTOR NEVER EXPECTED
Michael's hand shook.
Victor stood ten feet away.
The alarm continued screaming.
Four minutes, thirty seconds.
Lydia Hale stared at Daniel as if twenty-one years had disappeared.
“You're alive,” Daniel whispered.
“So are you.”
Michael looked between them.
“You know him?”
Lydia began crying.
Daniel stared at Michael.
“Yes.”
Victor laughed.
“Wonderful. Family reunions everywhere.”
Gabriel moved toward Michael.
“Put the gun down.”
Michael shook his head.
“He ruined my life.”
“So don't let him decide what you become next.”
Victor smiled.
“There he is.”
Gabriel ignored him.
Michael's breathing became faster.
Victor continued.
“Ask Daniel why Lydia disappeared.”
Daniel shouted, “Don't listen to him.”
Michael looked at Daniel.
“Why?”
Lydia answered.
“Because Victor threatened you.”
Michael turned toward her.
“What?”
“When you were a baby, Raymond wanted to expose Victor. Victor found out.”
She looked at Daniel.
“He threatened to kill Daniel if I didn't disappear.”
Daniel's face crumpled.
“You let me think you were dead.”
“I thought it kept you alive.”
Michael's gun lowered slightly.
Victor said, “Everybody always claims love when they're explaining cowardice.”
Gabriel turned toward him.
“My mother used to say the same thing about you.”
Victor's smile vanished.
Three minutes.
Daniel grabbed Lydia.
“We have to move.”
Michael still held the gun.
Gabriel stepped toward him.
“Come with us.”
Michael looked at Victor.
“He deserves to die.”
“Maybe.”
Gabriel's answer surprised everyone.
“But if you kill him because he wants you angry enough to do it, then he gets exactly what he wanted.”
Ethan appeared at the stairwell.
“My mother and Margaret are downstairs.”
Gabriel turned sharply.
“I told you to leave.”
Ethan shrugged.
“I'm apparently bad at following my father's instructions.”
For the first time that night, Gabriel actually smiled.
Tiny.
Gone immediately.
Victor saw it.
Something hateful entered his face.
“You think this is a family?”
Gabriel looked at Ethan.
Then Daniel.
Michael.
Lydia.
Me.
Madison.
“Yes.”
Victor's face twisted.
“You met half of them tonight.”
“And somehow they have lied to me less than you did in forty-two years.”
Victor grabbed the remote again.
Michael raised the gun.
“Don't.”
Victor pressed another button.
The countdown dropped from three minutes to sixty seconds.
Daniel shouted.
“Run!”
Everyone moved.
Gabriel grabbed Victor.
Victor fought him.
Ethan ran back.
Gabriel screamed, “GO!”
Ethan ignored him.
Together, father and son dragged Victor toward the stairwell.
Victor kicked Ethan in the stomach.
Gabriel struck his father hard enough to send him against the wall.
For one terrifying second, Gabriel stood over him.
Victor smiled through blood.
“There you are.”
Gabriel's fist stopped.
Victor whispered, “My son.”
Gabriel lowered his hand.
“No.”
He pulled Victor upright.
“Your prisoner.”
We reached the twelfth floor when the explosion hit.
The building shook.
Windows blew outward.
Smoke filled the stairwell.
I lost my footing.
Gabriel caught me.
Ethan helped Lydia.
Daniel carried Raymond, who had been injured in the struggle.
Michael supported his mother.
Victor coughed but remained conscious.
We stumbled into the street seconds before flames climbed through the upper windows.
Fire engines were already approaching.
Daniel had called them before entering.
Victor looked at the burning hotel.
For the first time, he looked old.
Gabriel stood beside him.
“You're done.”
Victor smiled faintly.
“You still need the ledger.”
Gabriel's phone rang.
One of Daniel's men.
They had opened the hidden compartment in Isabella's sewing room.
They had found the ledger.
Boxes of records.
Photographs.
Bank statements.
Audio recordings.
Enough evidence to expose Victor, Raymond, and dozens of people.
Raymond started laughing.
Victor turned.
“What?”
Raymond smiled through a bruised face.
“You forgot one thing.”
Victor stared.
“Isabella never trusted paper alone.”
Gabriel looked at him.
“What does that mean?”
Raymond said, “Copies.”
Victor's face changed.
“Where?”
Raymond laughed harder.
“I don't know.”
Gabriel understood.
“My mother made copies.”
Raymond nodded.
“And she gave them to someone.”
Victor looked toward Margaret.
My mother became still.
Gabriel noticed.
“Margaret?”
Mom sighed.
“Isabella gave me a safe-deposit key.”
Victor lunged.
Police seized him immediately.
“Where?”
My mother looked directly at him.
“You spent twenty-four years searching for witnesses.”
She smiled.
“You never searched the woman you decided was too frightened to matter.”
Victor's expression became pure rage.
Mom turned to Gabriel.
“The copies are in a federal evidence locker under a sealed whistleblower agreement.”
Gabriel stared.
“You've had them all this time?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you expose him?”
“Because Isabella believed Victor had people inside every agency.”
Daniel nodded.
“She wasn't wrong.”
Mom continued.
“But the agreement activates automatically if I die.”
Victor stopped struggling.
For the first time all night, fear entered his eyes.
He couldn't kill her.
He couldn't silence the evidence.
Gabriel looked at his father.
“That's why you kept her alive.”
Victor said nothing.
Police vehicles surrounded the scene.
Raymond began negotiating almost immediately.
He offered testimony.
Names.
Accounts.
Every crime he could place on Victor.
Victor stared at Gabriel.
“You think this ends because police put me in a car?”
Gabriel didn't answer.
Victor leaned closer as officers handcuffed him.
“You still don't know the worst thing your mother did.”
Gabriel's eyes narrowed.
Victor smiled.
“She didn't save Elena because she suddenly found a conscience.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She saved Elena because Elena knew what Isabella had done.”
Victor was placed in the police cruiser.
Gabriel grabbed the open door.
“What did my mother do?”
Victor looked almost delighted.
“Ask Elena about June 1998.”
Then the police pulled away.
Gabriel turned.
Elena stood behind us.
She had heard everything.
Her face had gone pale.
Ethan looked at her.
“Mom?”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“What happened in June 1998?”
Elena whispered, “Gabriel…”
“What did my mother do?”
Tears filled Elena's eyes.
“She killed someone.”
Silence.
Gabriel stared.
“Who?”
Elena looked toward the burning hotel.
May you like
Then back at the man she had loved at seventeen.
“Your older brother.”
