Chapter 7 - THE PRICE OF KEEPING QUIET
“Elias Ward has worked for my family for twelve years.”
Rafael spoke as though he were trying to convince himself.
Bianca looked at the floor.
“I know.”
“He attended my father's funeral.”
“I know.”
“My son trusts him.”
Bianca finally raised her eyes.
“That's why Julian chose him.”
I stood near the window, remembering how Ward had taken Oliver by the shoulders during the emergency.
He'd looked toward the balcony.
He'd known where the danger was.
And he'd done nothing to warn us.
Rafael turned to Detective Brooks.
“I want every payment made to Ward's company examined.”
“We've already requested the relevant business records,” she replied. “We'll also need his statement.”
Rafael nodded.
For a moment, he looked older than forty-five.
Then he turned back to Bianca.
“What did Julian have on him?”
“I don't know everything.”
“Tell me what you do know.”
Bianca took a shaky breath.
“Eight years ago, Elias was responsible for the security records at Harborview during the construction dispute. Your father asked him to preserve footage of a meeting.”
“What meeting?”
“Julian and several suppliers were confronted about the recalled components.”
“And?”
“The footage disappeared.”
Rafael stared at her.
“Dad told me a camera system had failed.”
“It didn't fail.”
The silence that followed felt unbearable.
Bianca continued.
“Julian told Elias the missing footage would ruin his career if anyone learned he'd deliberately erased it. Later, Julian gave him consulting work. Paid him to help manage access to the old records.”
Rafael looked toward Detective Brooks.
“That doesn't explain why Elias helped him now.”
“No,” she agreed. “But it gives us something to investigate.”
I thought of the party photograph.
The handwriting beneath it.
9:17. WATCH REMOVED.
“Who wrote on that photograph?” I asked.
Bianca looked at me.
“What?”
“Someone wrote the exact time Julian took the watch. Who was keeping track?”
Her expression changed.
“I didn't know anyone was taking pictures.”
“Oliver found it outside the sitting room.”
Bianca leaned forward.
“Show me.”
Rafael handed her the photograph.
She studied it.
Then she pointed toward a thin strip of reflection along the mirror's edge.
“That isn't the ballroom photographer.”
I moved closer.
In the reflection, almost hidden behind a tall arrangement of white roses, stood a woman in a black service uniform.
She held a small camera.
I recognized her.
“That's Marisol.”
Rafael looked at me.
“Who?”
“Marisol Vega. She's one of the temporary catering supervisors.”
Bianca stared at the photograph.
“Julian fired her from Harborview last month.”
Rafael frowned.
“Why was a former Harborview employee working at our engagement party?”
I remembered something Marisol had said during the afternoon preparations.
She'd asked me whether I knew the safest route from the ballroom to the parking courtyard.
I'd assumed she was planning the catering cleanup.
Now I wasn't certain.
Detective Brooks requested the staffing records.
Marisol had signed in at five-thirty.
She had left the estate after the evacuation.
But the catering agency had supplied her address and contact information.
Within an hour, investigators located her at her sister's home.
Marisol agreed to speak with them.
She was forty-six, a widow with two grown sons, and she looked frightened when she entered the police interview room where Rafael and I were later permitted to join the discussion.
“I didn't know the chandelier was going to fall,” she said immediately.
Detective Brooks reassured her.
“Tell us why you were photographing the sitting room.”
Marisol opened a canvas bag.
Inside was a small camera and a yellow notebook.
“Because Julian Moreland has been removing records from Harborview for months.”
Rafael leaned forward.
“Why?”
“His company had access to the maintenance rooms. He told us it was routine cleanup before a property review.”
“What property review?”
Marisol hesitated.
Then answered.
“The redevelopment agreement.”
Rafael frowned.
“I haven't approved redevelopment at Harborview.”
“I know.”
She opened the notebook.
“That's why I started keeping dates. The maintenance office was being emptied before anybody authorized the project.”
She turned several pages.
The entries included equipment deliveries, contractor visits, and boxes removed from locked storage.
One date was circled.
It was the day Bianca had requested the old watch.
Marisol explained that Julian had asked her to retrieve an engineering folder from Harborview. When she refused, he terminated her contract.
She had suspected something serious enough to warn the Blackstone family.
But nobody had returned her messages.
“So you took a catering job at the mansion,” I said.
She nodded.
“I needed to see who was meeting with Julian.”
Rafael looked at her.
“Why didn't you come to me directly?”
She gave him a sad smile.
“Mr. Blackstone, your security director was the man screening your visitors.”
Rafael looked away.
Marisol removed a photograph from her notebook.
It showed a metal fastening plate inside a Harborview maintenance shaft.
Stamped into its side was the same letter M we'd found on the chandelier bolt.
But another detail caught Rebecca Shaw's attention when Detective Brooks showed her the image.
A manufacturing batch number.
M-44.
Rebecca compared it with the damaged chandelier bolt.
Then she made a call to the original manufacturer's technical department.
The answer arrived shortly afterward.
The two components belonged to the same recalled batch.
But the Harborview photograph revealed something even more disturbing.
The metal around the plate had begun to split.
Rebecca looked at Rafael.
“Those residents needed to be moved. You've made the right call.”
Rafael exhaled slowly.
“Can it be repaired?”
“Yes. But we need to determine how much of the original assembly was affected.”
Marisol turned to another page.
“There's one more thing.”
She pointed to a work order scheduled for the following morning.
Three crews.
Six hours.
Replacement of concealed structural hardware.
The authorized contractor was Moreland Engineering.
I looked at Rafael.
“Julian is trying to remove the evidence before the inspectors finish.”
Marisol shook her head.
“There's something worse.”
She pointed to the work order's final instruction.
It read:
Existing mounting assemblies to be removed simultaneously. Temporary bracing not included.
Rebecca's expression changed immediately.
“If they remove those supports together, parts of the old wing could become unstable.”
Rafael stood.
“Call the city inspector. Stop the work order.”
Detective Brooks reached for her radio.
Then Marisol turned to the notebook's last page.
A name had been written beside the scheduled crew arrival.
Not Julian Moreland.
Not Elias Ward.
A third name.
Someone Rafael recognized.
He stared at it.
May you like
Then whispered:
“That's the man who managed my father's final construction project.”
