Chapter 11 - THE MAN ADRIAN TRUSTED
Marcus did not reach for his weapon.
That was the first reason Adrian didn’t believe Victoria.
The second was simpler.
Marcus looked hurt, not afraid.
“I was with you,” he said. “At the Harbor House meeting.”
Adrian remembered.
A room full of witnesses.
Victoria rolled her eyes.
“Not the whole night.”
Ortiz separated everyone before the argument could become useless.
Back at headquarters, traffic records showed Marcus’s vehicle left Harbor House for forty-three minutes.
He had never mentioned it.
“Why?” Adrian asked.
Marcus stared at the table.
“My daughter called.”
Adrian blinked.
“You don’t have a daughter.”
“I did.”
Marcus explained that his eighteen-year-old daughter, Tessa, had struggled with addiction. He kept her private because enemies of the Vale family already knew too much about everyone around Adrian.
The night of Elise’s crash, Tessa called from a gas station. Marcus drove to get her.
“She died three months later,” he said quietly.
Adrian’s anger softened into shame.
Ortiz checked the gas station camera archive through an old insurance claim.
Marcus was there.
Victoria’s accusation collapsed.
But the footage gave them something else.
At 10:43 p.m., a dark sedan passed the station heading toward the road where Elise crashed.
Registered to Mercer Holdings.
Driver listed on a parking citation two hours earlier:
Charles Mercer.
Adrian exhaled slowly.
Then Ortiz’s partner entered.
“We found Charles.”
“Where?”
“Not where you want him.”
A television was turned on.
Charles Mercer stood at a press conference beside two attorneys.
He claimed Victoria had suffered a breakdown after years of manipulation by Adrian Vale.
He accused Adrian of kidnapping his own daughters from lawful guardians.
Then he held up a document.
A court order.
Temporary custody of Clara and Mia had been granted to Charles pending investigation.
Ortiz stared at the screen.
“How the hell did he get that?”
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Adrian was already reaching for his phone.
At the hospital, Clara’s security alarm began to ring.
