Chapter 5 - The Name Daniel Should Have Known
Victor Harrington remained beside Elena until the rescue team lifted the slab from her shoulder.
Another rescuer carried Mason toward the helicopter.
“His fever is dangerous,” the medic said. “But he’s stable.”
Victor touched his grandson’s face.
The tenderness lasted only a second.
Then he turned toward the documents scattered across the floor.
One of his specialists collected them in evidence bags.
Victor read the top page.
His expression became frighteningly calm.
“Where did these come from?”
“Daniel’s briefcase,” Elena said.
“Did you know about them?”
“No.”
Victor examined the altered inspection certificate.
“I recognize the supplier. Harrington Global banned them six years ago after a series of failed stress tests.”
Elena closed her eyes.
The Royal Crest had not collapsed because the earthquake was unusually powerful.
It collapsed because Daniel had built a twelve-story lie and filled it with people.
“How many are hurt?” she asked.
“We don’t know yet.”
Victor crouched beside her.
“This is not your fault.”
“I brought Mason here.”
“You trusted your husband to obey the law.”
“I trusted him with everything.”
The rescue harness tightened around her.
As the helicopter lifted Elena above the ruins, she looked down at the Royal Crest.
Half of the atrium was gone. Emergency crews moved through clouds of dust. Guests sat on the street wrapped in blankets.
On the far side of the city, Daniel sat beside Vanessa in an ambulance, unaware that his wife and child were being flown to Harrington Medical Center.
He also remained unaware that every major news network had captured the helicopter rescue.
Reporters recognized Victor immediately.
Within minutes, photographs appeared online.
Victor Harrington personally rescues unidentified woman and child from collapsed Royal Crest Hotel.
Daniel saw the headline while waiting outside Vanessa’s examination room.
He enlarged the photograph.
The image showed Victor kneeling beside Elena.
Daniel stopped breathing.
He knew Victor Harrington’s face.
Everyone in construction knew it.
Vanessa came out wearing a small bandage.
“What’s wrong?”
Daniel turned the phone toward her.
“That’s Elena.”
“So?”
“That man is Victor Harrington.”
Vanessa frowned.
“Why would Victor Harrington rescue your wife?”
Daniel stared at the screen.
Then he remembered details he had ignored for years.
Elena’s ability to identify architectural styles instantly.
Her knowledge of corporate negotiations.
The old photograph of her mother at a charity gala.
The way high-level executives sometimes looked at Elena as though they recognized her.
Most of all, he remembered her father’s first name.
Victor.
Daniel sank into a chair.
“No,” he whispered.
Vanessa understood before he finished.
“Elena’s father?”
Daniel’s phone rang.
May you like
The caller was his company’s legal director.
“Daniel,” the man said, his voice shaking, “the police found documents inside your briefcase.”
