Chapter 2 - Flight 417
“Tell me what he signed.”
Victor remained in the aisle outside the rear stateroom.
Laura stood between him and Noah.
Grace had quietly called the captain through the cabin intercom and requested that the cockpit secure its door.
The aircraft was forty minutes into a transatlantic flight from Teterboro to London.
Now Laura wanted it turned around.
Victor knew.
“You cannot divert a company aircraft because you found an old video.”
Laura almost laughed.
“You struck my son, lied to my face, and knew my supposedly dead husband flew on this aircraft.”
“Ethan was complicated.”
“Was he alive?”
“Yes.”
Noah gasped.
Laura had expected the answer.
Hearing it still split something inside her.
“How long?”
Victor looked away.
“Not long.”
“How long?”
“Eleven weeks after the accident.”
Laura gripped the edge of the desk.
Five years of grief rearranged itself in one sentence.
Eleven weeks.
Birthdays.
Hospital paperwork.
Funeral arrangements without a body.
Night after night with three-year-old Noah asking when Dad was coming home.
“He was alive for eleven weeks.”
“Yes.”
“And you knew.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because Ethan asked me not to.”
Laura stepped toward him.
Victor raised both hands.
“That is the truth.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“Play more footage.”
Grace had already found another archived file.
Flight 417’s manifest listed only four passengers.
Victor Mercer.
Ethan Mercer, entered under the alias Edward March.
Andrea Shaw.
And Dr. Lena Cole.
Laura frowned.
“Who is Lena Cole?”
Victor said nothing.
Grace searched the internal crew notes.
“Contract flight physician.”
“Why did Ethan need a doctor?”
“He had survived a crash,” Victor said.
Laura turned.
The words were almost too obvious to process.
“What happened that day?”
Victor leaned against the wall.
“Ethan’s experimental aircraft lost engine control over the Atlantic. He ditched it.”
“The Coast Guard searched for six days.”
“A Mercer maintenance vessel reached him first.”
Laura stared.
“You found him?”
“Dad’s old offshore recovery team did.”
“Why wasn’t he taken to a hospital?”
“He was.”
“Where?”
“A private clinic.”
“Under another name?”
“Yes.”
Laura felt sick.
“Who made that decision?”
Victor did not answer quickly enough.
“You.”
“Ethan agreed.”
“Why?”
Victor looked toward Noah.
Laura said, “Grace, take Noah forward.”
“No.”
Noah grabbed his mother’s hand.
“I want to know.”
“You don’t need every part.”
“He’s my dad.”
Laura crouched.
“You’re right. But some of this belongs to adults first.”
Noah’s face tightened.
“Everybody always says that before they hide something.”
The sentence silenced her.
Five years of adults deciding what Noah could handle had already cost him enough.
“Stay beside me,” she said.
Victor exhaled.
“Ethan believed someone had sabotaged the aircraft.”
Laura went still.
“He thought the crash wasn’t an accident?”
“No.”
“And he trusted you?”
“At first.”
“At first.”
Victor’s expression darkened.
“Ethan never trusted anyone for long.”
“Did he trust Andrea?”
“Yes.”
Laura looked at the frozen image of Andrea Shaw.
Andrea had drafted Ethan’s will twelve years earlier.
After his disappearance, she had handled the probate petition, insurance coordination, transfer of Ethan’s Mercer Aviation voting shares into the Noah Mercer Family Trust, and the appointment of Victor as special voting trustee.
Laura suddenly understood why the video mattered.
“What did Ethan sign on Flight 417?”
Victor said, “A temporary voting proxy.”
“To you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he couldn’t appear publicly.”
“And the trust amendment?”
Victor’s eyes changed.
Laura noticed.
“What amendment?”
“You know exactly which amendment. The one giving you control of Noah’s shares until he turns twenty-five.”
“That was Ethan’s estate plan.”
“Was it?”
Silence.
Laura turned to the tablet.
Andrea’s electronic file directory was still embedded in the archive metadata.
One scanned document appeared.
TEMPORARY EMERGENCY PROXY.
Expires ninety days after execution.
Laura whispered, “Ninety days.”
Victor said nothing.
She opened the trust document filed after Ethan’s legal death.
Victor’s voting authority lasted until Noah’s twenty-fifth birthday.
Seventeen years.
Laura looked at him.
“These are not the same.”
“Different instruments.”
“Convenient.”
Grace entered the cockpit call code.
The captain responded.
Laura said, “Captain Reed, turn us around.”
Victor stepped forward.
“You cannot order that.”
Laura looked at him.
“I own twenty-eight percent of Mercer Aviation.”
“I’m executive chairman.”
“And Noah owns thirty-four percent through Ethan’s trust.”
“Which I vote.”
“For now.”
Victor’s face hardened.
Captain Reed answered carefully.
“Mrs. Mercer, given the reported assault and security concern, I am diverting back to Teterboro.”
Victor swore.
Noah flinched.
Grace stepped between them again.
“Sit down, Mr. Mercer.”
Victor stared at her.
“You will never work aboard another Mercer aircraft.”
Grace answered:
“If the camera keeps working, I may be the only person here who does.”
Laura almost smiled.
Then the tablet chimed.
Another Flight 417 video had finished restoring.
The stateroom appeared.
Ethan lay on the bed.
His face was bruised.
Andrea stood beside him.
Victor entered carrying a folder.
Ethan said:
“I’ll give you the proxy until I can prove who tampered with the engine.”
Victor answered:
“And Laura?”
“She stays out of it.”
Laura closed her eyes.
Ethan had chosen secrecy too.
Then he said:
“If I’m right, someone inside Mercer Aviation tried to kill me.”
Victor replied:
“You are right.”
Ethan stared at him.
“Who?”
Victor moved closer to the camera.
His voice lowered.
“I know who ordered it.”
The recovered file ended.
Laura slowly looked at Victor.
“You knew who sabotaged his aircraft.”
Victor’s face gave nothing away.
Then Noah whispered:
May you like
“Was it you?”
And for the first time, Victor could not look at him.
