Chapter 3 - The First Person Maria Feared
Maria led Isabella toward the stern escape locker.
“Why didn’t Dad warn me?”
“He tried.”
“When?”
“Six years ago.”
“I was twenty-eight.”
“You were fighting him over control of the company.”
Isabella remembered.
She had accused Victor of refusing to let her grow up.
He had told her Charles was dangerous.
She thought he meant corporate politics.
“I didn’t listen.”
“No.”
Maria’s honesty stung.
“Did he tell you to watch me?”
“He told me to keep you alive.”
The stern locker contained an emergency six-person inflatable raft stored behind a manual hatch.
Maria checked the sea outside.
Julian’s tender remained on the starboard side.
They were on port.
Darkness protected them.
Maria inflated the raft.
A compressed cylinder hissed.
Isabella whispered, “They’ll hear.”
“The flooding alarms are louder.”
They lowered themselves.
The ocean hit like ice.
Maria carried the waterproof phone, evidence, and drive inside a flotation bag.
They paddled without lights.
Behind them Solenne listed farther.
Julian’s tender circled.
Then Isabella heard Camille scream.
“Oh my God! It’s going down!”
Isabella turned.
Julian wrapped an arm around Camille.
Even from a distance, the performance was exquisite.
“Keep moving,” Maria whispered.
Thirty minutes later Maria activated a small emergency locator she had modified to transmit only an identification code to a Coast Guard contact.
Isabella stared.
“You have a Coast Guard contact?”
“Your father had one.”
“Who?”
“Grace Holloway.”
“That’s not Coast Guard.”
Grace had been Victor’s estate attorney.
“She knows whom to call.”
Maria sent a four-word message.
VICTOR PROTOCOL. TWO ALIVE.
Then shut the phone down.
They waited.
Isabella’s teeth chattered.
“Tell me about the stairs.”
Maria stared into the darkness.
“Charles had been moving money through maintenance vendors.”
“How did you know?”
“I managed household payroll and property staff. One invoice listed twelve workers at Bellhaven for a renovation.”
“There were only six.”
“Yes.”
“So you asked questions.”
“I always asked questions.”
“That was your mistake?”
Maria smiled faintly.
“To Charles, yes.”
She had found duplicates of vendor checks in Victor’s study.
Charles entered.
Maria confronted him.
“He told me I misunderstood.”
“What did you say?”
“That I would show Victor.”
Maria looked toward her legs.
“He followed me into the hall.”
The grand staircase at Bellhaven curved three stories through the central atrium.
Isabella remembered Maria at the bottom.
Blood.
Screaming.
Charles shouting for an ambulance.
“I saw him kneeling beside you.”
“He pushed me, then ran down and became the first person to help.”
Isabella closed her eyes.
“How?”
“He knew performance mattered.”
Julian’s crying voice over the radio returned to her.
Maria continued.
“I fractured two vertebrae. Damaged nerves. Doctors said recovery was uncertain.”
“But you recovered.”
“Yes.”
“Why keep pretending after?”
“Because Victor found proof Charles had ordered someone to search my hospital room.”
Isabella stared.
“What?”
“The night before I was discharged.”
“For evidence?”
“Probably.”
“Dad knew Charles pushed you?”
“He believed me.”
“And did nothing?”
Maria’s face hardened.
“He did something foolish.”
“What?”
“He decided he needed enough evidence to remove Charles without destroying Laurent Oceanic.”
Isabella laughed bitterly.
“Protect the company.”
“Yes.”
“That sentence is going to kill all of us.”
Maria looked at her.
“It killed your father.”
A distant engine approached.
Maria pulled Isabella down inside the raft.
A dark vessel appeared.
Coast Guard markings were visible only when it came close.
A man leaned over.
“Maria Alvarez?”
“Yes.”
“Grace sent us.”
They were pulled aboard.
The officer introduced himself as Lieutenant Owen Becker.
“You’re Isabella Laurent?”
She hesitated.
Maria answered.
“Yes.”
Becker looked startled.
“The yacht casualty was reported fifteen minutes ago. Mr. Cross told the Coast Guard two women were trapped below deck and presumed lost.”
Isabella’s jaw tightened.
“Presumed?”
“He said flooding made rescue impossible.”
Maria asked, “Did he say he tried?”
“Yes.”
Isabella laughed once.
It sounded almost broken.
Becker continued.
“We can bring you directly to Newport.”
Maria shook her head.
“No public arrival.”
He frowned.
“This is an active rescue.”
“Lieutenant, somebody sabotaged that yacht.”
Isabella handed him the waterproof phone.
“Video.”
Becker watched Julian tampering with the watertight door.
His face changed.
“I need to notify investigators.”
“Do it,” Isabella said.
“But do not tell Julian we’re alive yet.”
Becker looked uncertain.
Maria said, “If he thinks they died, he will start moving.”
Isabella looked toward the shrinking silhouette of Solenne.
“My uncle has seventy-two hours before he can invoke emergency voting authority.”
That got Becker’s attention.
“This is bigger than a yacht.”
“Yes.”
Within an hour they were transferred discreetly to a Coast Guard facility.
Grace Holloway arrived before dawn.
She was fifty-four, composed, and visibly shaken when she saw Isabella.
“Victor was right.”
Isabella stared.
“You knew?”
“Not everything.”
“Did you know Maria could walk?”
“Yes.”
Isabella laughed incredulously.
“How many people have been lying to me?”
Grace answered quietly.
“Fewer than the number lying about you right now.”
She placed a tablet on the table.
News alerts had begun.
LAURENT HEIRESS MISSING AFTER SUPERYACHT FLOODING.
FIANCÉ DESCRIBES DESPERATE RESCUE ATTEMPT.
PREGNANT COUSIN SURVIVES YACHT DISASTER.
There was video.
Julian wrapped in a blanket.
Camille crying against his shoulder.
Julian told reporters:
“I heard Isabella screaming. I tried everything.”
Isabella stared.
Then Camille spoke.
“Maria wouldn’t leave Isabella. They stayed together until the end.”
Maria’s expression went cold.
Isabella asked Grace, “What happens now?”
Grace looked at the encrypted drive.
“Now we find out whether Victor left enough evidence to stop Charles before Charles realizes his daughter helped murder you.”
A Coast Guard investigator entered.
“Ms. Laurent?”
“Yes.”
“We recovered something from Solenne before she settled.”
“What?”
“The external locking strap.”
Isabella looked at Maria.
Physical evidence.
Then the investigator continued.
“There’s another problem.”
“What?”
“The yacht’s chief engineer says Julian Cross told him you ordered the watertight system disabled for a privacy test.”
Isabella stared.
May you like
Julian was not only manufacturing grief.
He was already manufacturing blame.
