The Security Tape
Chapter 09 - The Security Tape
The drive to the hospital took eleven minutes that felt like an hour, Victor's driver weaving through traffic while Ava breathed through the specific, tightening fear of contractions that had started somewhere between the house and the highway.
She gripped the door handle with one hand and her father's arm with the other, counting each breath the way the birthing class instructor had taught her months earlier, back when she'd imagined this day would look nothing like the chaos of the last twenty-four hours.
Victor kept his voice low and steady beside her, the same tone he probably used to calm nervous board members before a difficult vote, though Ava could see, in the white grip of his knuckles against his own knee, that he was considerably more frightened than he was letting on.
Dr. Ruiz met them at the entrance, moving fast, professional calm layered over an urgency Ava recognized immediately.
"Your blood pressure's elevated significantly since this morning," Dr. Ruiz said, guiding her toward a wheelchair despite Ava's protest that she could still walk. "Combined with the swelling I noted yesterday, I want to monitor you closely for preeclampsia. This baby may need to come sooner than we planned."
"How much sooner," Ava asked, fear cutting through the exhaustion of the past twenty-four hours.
"I don't know yet," Dr. Ruiz said honestly. "Let's get you monitored properly before either of us starts guessing."
Victor stayed in the waiting room, pacing, while nurses hooked Ava up to monitors that beeped in a rhythm she found herself concentrating on entirely, as though focusing hard enough might will the numbers into safer ranges.
Marcus arrived an hour later, finding Victor still pacing, and pulled him aside with the specific urgency of a man who'd just confirmed something significant.
"I have it," Marcus said. "The full recording, uncut, along with financial records tracing every transfer Julian made to Crestline Consulting. I also found the source of last night's text. It wasn't Julian directly."
Victor stopped pacing. "Then who."
"His assistant," Marcus said. "A young man named Derek Poole, apparently acting under Julian's direct instruction, using a burner phone Julian purchased and handed to him three days ago. Derek's willing to talk. He's terrified of losing his own job over this, and considerably more terrified of facing charges as an accessory."
Marcus pulled up a still frame from a different camera, this one showing Derek's hands shaking as he'd typed the message, his face pale under the fluorescent light of what looked like a parking garage stairwell.
"He says Julian threatened to fire him and destroy his professional reputation if he refused," Marcus added. "I believe him. I don't think this young man had any real understanding of what he was actually being asked to help set in motion."
"Get him a lawyer," Victor said immediately. "If he cooperates fully, I want him protected, not punished for following orders out of fear."
Marcus nodded, already anticipating the instruction. "There's something else. Derek mentioned Julian has a second account. Not connected to Crestline. Something he's been building for over a year, separate from the company embezzlement entirely."
Victor's expression sharpened. "For what purpose."
"Derek didn't know the full details," Marcus said. "Only that Julian referred to it, more than once, as his insurance policy. In case anything ever happened to his marriage."
Victor felt a specific chill settle over him, the growing understanding that his son-in-law had been building an entire secondary life, financial and strategic, for considerably longer than anyone in this family had suspected.
A nurse appeared in the waiting room doorway, expression carefully neutral in the specific way medical professionals train themselves to hold before delivering news that could go either direction.
May you like
Victor felt his stomach drop the instant he saw her face, every instinct he'd honed across four decades of reading rooms and reading people telling him, all at once, that whatever came next was not going to be simple.
"Mr. Hayes," she said. "Your daughter's asking for you. Right now."
