Chapter 12 - Suite 1708
Suite 1708 was registered to a pharmaceutical executive who had died three years earlier.
Rook entered with a hotel master key while Elena and Mara monitored from the adjoining room. The safe stood behind a painting. Adrian’s key opened it.
Inside were passports, cash, a suppressed pistol, two flash drives, and a sealed envelope labeled AFTER THE VOWS.
The first flash drive contained surveillance footage from Vale Crown Ranch, Mara’s home, and the veterinary center. The second held financial ledgers and execution plans.
Rook opened the envelope.
It listed six names.
Silas Vale.
Elena Vale.
Mara Quinn.
Daniel Rook.
Adrian Cross.
Celeste Vane.
Beside each name was a time and location.
Silas was to die during a staged vehicle accident after the reception. Elena’s death would occur weeks later in an apparent riding accident. Mara would disappear. Rook would be blamed for selling evidence. Adrian and Celeste would die in a private plane crash.
Victor intended to erase the entire operation.
A seventh line was blank except for the initials H.C.
Mara photographed everything.
Then the suite door opened.
Celeste entered.
She saw Rook beside the safe and reached for her purse.
Elena stepped from the adjoining room holding the suppressed pistol they had removed from the safe.
“Don’t,” Elena said.
Celeste froze.
Mara closed the door behind her.
“You’re either very brave,” Celeste said, “or your father taught you badly.”
“He taught me never to point a weapon unless I’m prepared for what comes next.”
“Are you?”
Elena kept the pistol steady. “Sit down.”
Celeste obeyed.
Rook searched her purse and found a second phone, a vial of clear liquid, and a ballroom access badge.
“What is the liquid?” Mara asked.
Celeste smiled. “Ask Rebecca.”
Silas, listening through Elena’s earpiece, went silent.
Elena’s hand tightened around the weapon.
Celeste saw the reaction. “Your mother was offered a choice. Give us the ledger or trust her husband to survive without her.”
“You poisoned her,” Elena said.
“Victor did.”
“And you helped.”
“I delivered a message. Rebecca made her decision.”
Silas entered the suite.
Security concerns no longer mattered.
He crossed the room until he stood over Celeste. She looked up without fear.
“What did she choose?” he asked.
“To hide the ledger.”
Silas’s voice broke. “What were her last words?”
Celeste’s expression shifted, almost imperceptibly.
“You weren’t there,” Silas said.
She looked away.
“You don’t know.”
“No.”
“Then who was?”
Celeste said nothing.
Silas placed the decoded pages on the table. “You want these. I want the names and the truth about Rebecca.”
“You think Victor will trade?”
“I think Victor is not in charge.”
Celeste looked at him sharply.
“Harlan is,” Silas said.
Her silence confirmed it.
Rook’s earpiece crackled. Hotel security reported movement near the elevators. Several men were approaching the seventeenth floor.
Celeste smiled. “You opened the safe. They know.”
Rook checked the hallway camera. Four men in catering uniforms exited the elevator. A fifth remained near the stairs.
“We leave now,” he said.
They moved through the adjoining suite and into a service passage. Silas forced Celeste ahead of him. Elena carried the flash drives. Mara held the envelope.
At the end of the passage, a hotel employee opened a linen door and waved them inside.
It was Boone.
“Freight elevator,” he said.
They descended to the kitchen level as armed men searched the floor above.
In the loading area, Celeste suddenly stumbled. Silas caught her.
A red stain spread across her blouse.
She had been shot through the service-door window by a distant marksman.
Elena pressed a towel against the wound.
Celeste gasped for breath. “Victor… thinks he’s the son.”
“What does that mean?” Silas demanded.
She gripped his sleeve.
“Harlan is not his brother.”
Her eyes found Adrian, who had arrived with Rook’s backup team.
“He is Victor’s father.”
Adrian stared at her.
May you like
Celeste whispered, “And yours.”
Then she lost consciousness.
