Chapter 10 - The Woman Under the Table.
Elena dropped to her knees.
Lila Grant was bound beneath the table.
Her mouth was taped, and blood darkened one side of her hair.
Elena tore the tape away.
"Can you walk?"
Lila coughed.
"I think so."
Smoke filled the room.
Celeste stood near the burning curtain in shock.
Elena grabbed her arm.
"Move."
Together they dragged Lila outside into the rain.
Marcus and Damian were already fighting near the dock.
The wet boards turned every movement dangerous.
Damian struck Marcus in the ribs and ran toward the maintenance boat.
The rescue crew blocked the water route with their larger vessel.
Damian stopped.
For one second, he had nowhere to go.
Then he raised the flare gun again.
Elena shouted, "Drop it!"
Damian looked at her and smiled.
"You still think this is about a wedding?"
He fired toward the rescue boat.
The flare missed the crew and hissed into the water.
Marcus tackled him from the side.
The black drive fell from Damian's pocket and skidded across the dock.
Celeste saw it first.
She ran toward it.
Damian shoved Marcus away and lunged after her.
Elena reached the drive half a second before either of them.
She closed her fist around it.
Damian stopped three feet away.
"Give me that."
"No."
"You don't know what's on it."
"Sophia did."
His face hardened.
"And look where that got her."
Marcus hit him before Elena could react.
Damian crashed onto the dock.
The rescue crew restrained him.
For the first time that night, he looked genuinely afraid.
Back at the resort, the storm cut external power, but emergency generators kept the secure office running.
The black drive was encrypted.
Tomas's technician began copying it to an isolated computer.
Celeste sat across the room with an ice pack against her cheek.
Marcus would not look at her.
Lila was being treated by the resort doctor.
Elena stood beside the computer.
"How long?"
"Minutes if the password is simple. Hours if it isn't."
Ruby's voice came from the doorway.
"Red umbrella."
Elena turned.
"Sweetheart, you should be in bed."
Ruby held the stuffed rabbit, now crudely stitched by a nurse.
"Mommy said red umbrella means remember."
The technician typed REDUMBRELLA.
The drive unlocked.
Hundreds of files appeared.
Bank transfers.
Photographs.
Audio recordings.
Scanned contracts.
And one folder labeled S-ACCIDENT.
Marcus sat down beside Elena.
Inside the folder was a video from a marina security camera recorded two years earlier.
The timestamp matched the night Sophia died.
The image showed Sophia walking toward her boat.
A man entered the frame after her.
Damian Cross.
He looked around, opened the engine compartment, and reached inside.
Marcus's hands closed into fists.
But the video continued.
A second person appeared.
A woman in a hooded coat.
She stood beside Damian while he worked.
Then she turned toward the camera.
Elena leaned closer.
Marcus whispered, "No."
The face on the screen was not Celeste.
May you like
It was Patricia Avery.
Celeste's mother.
