Chương 13
“We can secure private data while preserving evidence.”
“You have no idea what is in that system.”
“I know enough.”
“No, you know what people showed you after a child embarrassed you in front of your own car.”
Alexander felt the words strike because they were partly true.
Nolan saw it.
“I kept those hotels alive,” he said. “Your father knew exactly what the alternatives were. Close properties. Fire people. Default on loans. He let me build mechanisms that gave us room to survive.”
“You stole from employees.”
“I moved money.”
“You threatened them.”
“Grant handled compliance.”
Grant’s face hardened. “Don’t.”
Nolan did not look at him. “Your father understood that businesses are not churches. There are no clean hands. There are only people willing to hold the weight and people who inherit the result.”
Claire spoke through a split lip. “You paid for your son’s wedding with stolen overtime.”
Nolan turned.
“That’s what bothers you?” she asked. “Not the people hurt. Not the families watched. The wedding. Because it’s small enough to understand.”
“Be quiet.”
“You told yourself you saved jobs, then bought imported flowers.”
Grant crossed the room and struck her shoulder with the back of his hand.
Alexander moved.
The pistol swung toward him.
A voice sounded in his earpiece.
Hold.
He stopped.
Claire straightened slowly. Pain crossed her face, but she did not make a sound.
Nolan’s control was thinning. “Give me the drive.”
Alexander held it out.
Nolan reached.
Grant said, “Check him.”
Nolan paused.
“Check for what?”
“A wire.”
The room became still.
Grant stepped toward Alexander.
The agents needed a clear signal or an immediate threat. Alexander had been instructed not to provoke either man. He was also supposed to keep Grant away from the microphone if possible.
He looked at Claire.
Her gaze dropped briefly to the bedside table.
A room-service ice bucket sat there, though the motel offered no room service. Its mirrored surface reflected part of the bathroom doorway.
In the reflection, Alexander saw movement.
Another person.
Paul Dennison stood inside the bathroom, mostly hidden, holding a second gun.
The thermal reading had suggested three people besides Alexander. Agents believed it might be plumbing.
No one outside knew Paul was there.
Grant reached Alexander and searched his coat. He found the phone agents expected him to find and tossed it onto the bed. His hand moved toward Alexander’s shirt.
Alexander made a decision.
“The house must stand,” he said.
It was the emergency phrase.
Grant’s expression changed.
The motel door exploded inward.
Everything happened too quickly and not quickly enough.
Grant turned his gun toward the entry. Claire dropped sideways. Nolan seized Alexander’s arm. Paul emerged from the bathroom and fired through the wall toward the adjoining room.
The sound was violent in the small space.
Agents entered shouting commands.
Alexander drove his shoulder into Nolan and pushed him toward the floor. Nolan clung to his coat. Grant fired once. The bullet struck the ceiling.
Claire rolled behind the bed.
Paul grabbed her by the hair and pulled her upright, his gun against her neck.
“Back up!” he screamed.
The agents stopped.
Dust drifted from the ceiling. A smoke alarm began chirping.
Alexander lay partly beneath Nolan, who was gasping from the impact. Grant’s pistol had fallen near the dresser. An agent kicked it away and pinned him to the carpet.
Paul dragged Claire toward the bathroom.
His face was wet with sweat. His pupils were wide. The gun trembled against her skin.
“I didn’t sign up for this,” he said.
No one answered.
“I just did schedules.”
Claire’s bound hands rose slightly.
“Paul,” she said, “you told Lily she couldn’t come inside.”
His mouth twisted. “She shouldn’t have been there.”
“You left her beside the trash.”
“I didn’t touch her.”
“You left her.”
“Shut up.”
Alexander pushed himself to his knees.
An agent ordered him to stay down.
Paul looked at him. “You. Tell them to back off.”
Alexander did not have authority over the agents, and Paul probably knew it. Fear was making him reach for the old structure in which Alexander’s name controlled every room.
“I can’t,” Alexander said.
“You own them.”
“No.”
“You own everything.”
“No.”
Paul’s gun pressed harder against Claire’s neck.
Nolan spoke from the floor. “Do what he says, Alexander.”
The agents shouted at Nolan to remain silent.
Alexander looked at Paul.
“You’re right,” he said. “Lily shouldn’t have been there.”
Claire’s eyes moved toward him.
“She shouldn’t have had to come to the hotel. She shouldn’t have had to stand in front of my car. Claire shouldn’t have needed to hide evidence in my office to make me notice.”
Paul’s breathing remained fast, but he was listening.
“I let people like Nolan make decisions in my name,” Alexander continued. “You let Grant make decisions in yours.”
“I didn’t take her.”
“You helped move her.”
“I drove once.”
“That was enough.”
Paul’s face crumpled with sudden anger. “He said they’d blame me for the pills. He said I’d go to prison. My brother has my kids this week. You don’t know—”
“You’re right. I don’t know your life.”
“Then stop talking.”
“But I know Lily’s mother is standing in front of you. You decide what happens next.”
Paul shook his head.
“Nolan decided.”
“No,” Alexander said. “He gave you a choice that made you afraid. You still chose.”
Nolan said, “He is manipulating you.”
Paul’s gun shifted.
Claire saw it before anyone else. She drove her bound hands upward into Paul’s wrist and dropped her weight.
The gun fired.
The bullet entered the bathroom wall.
Agents crossed the room.
Paul went down beneath them. Claire struck the floor on one knee and cried out. Alexander reached her before remembering he had been ordered to stay back.
She recoiled from him.
He stopped.
May you like
“It’s over,” he said.
She looked at the agents restraining Paul, at Grant facedown near the dresser, and at Nolan pressed against the carpet with one cheek against the faded pattern.
