Chapter 9 - The Hidden Floor
St. Matthew’s Hospital officially had eleven floors.
The elevator panel listed ten patient floors and one administrative level.
But old construction plans revealed an intermediate service floor between levels seven and eight.
It had once housed ventilation equipment, storage rooms, and an isolation unit built during a tuberculosis outbreak.
The floor had been sealed during renovations.
Liam, Rachel, Vance, and two officers entered through a maintenance stairwell.
The door required a hospital master code.
Someone had changed it.
A facilities engineer cut the lock.
Beyond it, the corridor was dark.
Dust covered the floor near the entrance, but farther inside, recent footprints marked the concrete.
Electrical cables ran beneath the doors.
The supposedly abandoned level still had power.
They found three rooms containing beds, restraints, medication cabinets, and surveillance equipment.
No patients.
In a fourth room, a monitor displayed live images from inside the hospital.
Liam’s apartment.
Rachel’s office.
Detective Vance’s car.
Sophia and Ethan’s house.
“They’ve been watching everything,” Rachel whispered.
A fifth screen showed the emergency department.
Liam saw himself standing in the hidden room.
The camera angle came from the ceiling above them.
“Someone knows we’re here.”
The lights went out.
A metal door slammed at the far end of the corridor.
The officers drew their weapons.
Vance activated her flashlight.
“Stay behind me.”
A speaker crackled overhead.
Ethan’s voice filled the hallway.
“You should have listened when Sophia asked you to stop.”
Liam looked toward the ceiling.
“Where is she?”
“Safe.”
“You call those bruises safe?”
“She was confused. She resisted treatment.”
“You beat her.”
“You always reduce complicated situations to simple diagnoses.”
“You’re not complicated. You’re a coward.”
Silence followed.
Then Ethan laughed.
“You think anger makes you strong, Liam. It makes you predictable.”
The ventilation system activated.
A strange odor entered the corridor.
Vance covered her mouth.
“Move. Now.”
They ran toward the stairwell.
The door would not open.
One officer smashed the small glass panel beside it and reached for the emergency release.
Rachel began coughing.
Liam used his coat to cover her face.
The release clicked.
They escaped into the stairwell moments before the corridor filled with gas.
Hospital security searched the floor.
Ethan was gone.
The speaker system had been remotely activated.
However, the surveillance room contained evidence.
Patient transfer forms.
Medication logs.
Forged guardianship orders.
Payment records.
One document stated that Sophia had been declared temporarily incapable of making medical decisions.
Her designated guardian was Ethan Cole.
The secondary physician approval carried Liam’s forged signature.
Charles Mercer’s authorization appeared at the bottom.
Vance issued an arrest warrant for Mercer.
He had already left the country.
Airport records showed he boarded a private flight to Montreal six hours earlier.
Dr. Vale remained in custody.
He refused to speak.
The hospital suspended multiple administrators and security employees.
Yet Sophia remained missing.
Liam reviewed every camera recording available from the building.
At 2:14 that morning, an ambulance had exited the service garage.
The vehicle’s number belonged to St. Matthew’s.
Its scheduled route did not exist.
The driver wore a hospital uniform and kept his face hidden.
In the rear compartment, a nurse leaned over a patient.
Liam enlarged the image.
The nurse was Nora Price, the missing employee from New Dawn.
The patient’s face could not be seen.
The ambulance was found abandoned near an industrial park.
Inside were traces of Sophia’s blood.
A broken syringe lay beneath the stretcher.
The ambulance’s navigation system had been removed.
However, a nearby traffic camera captured the vehicle following a black sedan onto the highway.
The sedan was registered to James Mercer.
Charles Mercer’s son.
The letters on the New Dawn wall returned to Liam’s mind.
E C J M.
Ethan Cole.
James Mercer.
Not Julia.
James was thirty-four, wealthy, and rarely seen in public.
He managed Northstar’s international accounts.
He also sat on the Bennett Foundation’s advisory committee.
Liam had met him twice.
Quiet.
Polite.
Forgettable.
Exactly the kind of man no one noticed.
Vance located James’s city apartment.
It was empty.
His passport remained in a drawer.
His banking activity showed a fuel purchase at a rural station west of Boston.
Police searched surrounding properties.
Rachel found an address associated with an old Mercer family trust.
A farmhouse near Glenhaven.
Liam insisted on joining the search.
Vance refused.
“This time you stay at the hospital.”
“That’s what you said before.”
“And you nearly died from chemical exposure.”
“She may need a doctor.”
“She needs a brother who isn’t under arrest for interfering with an operation.”
Liam remained behind.
Two hours later, Vance called.
They had found the farmhouse.
There was blood inside.
Medication.
Restraints.
And signs of a struggle.
Sophia was gone.
Ethan was gone.
May you like
James Mercer was lying dead in the kitchen.
In his hand was a piece of paper bearing Liam’s name.
