Chapter 1 - The Six-Minute Window
The screech of rubber tearing against asphalt shattered the quiet midnight air of Palm Island, echoing sharply through the gated perimeter of my estate. Alexander Hayes did not bother waiting for the electronic security gates to slide open. His custom-armored Mercedes-Maybach slammed directly into the reinforced steel barrier, shearing the motorized hinges off their mounts with a deafening metallic shriek that rattled the multi-million-dollar mansions lining the waterfront.
Inside the vehicle, Alexander sat in the back seat with his laptop open, his jaw clenched so tightly that muscles twitched along his cheekbones. His private physician, Dr. Marcus Thorne, and two trauma nurses sat across from him, surrounded by mobile life-support units and surgical trays.
—Two minutes out, Mr. Hayes, —Dr. Thorne warned, his voice steady despite the violent sway of the car as it tore around a tight curve. —If she’s lost as much blood as you estimate, and the placenta has detached, we have a very narrow window to save both mother and child.
Alexander didn't look up from his screen. His fingers flew across the keyboard, overriding the property’s master smart-home system by bypassing my firewall with a secondary encryption key he had memorized years ago when we were still brothers in arms.
—Open the front doors, unlock the perimeter lights, and disable the alarm grid, —Alexander ordered coldly into his phone's secure comms channel linked to his personal security detail trailing right behind him in an SUV. —And if Michael’s security company tries to intervene, neutralize them immediately.
—Understood, sir, —came the crisp reply.
Six minutes.
That was all it had taken for Alexander to cross the causeway from his estate to mine, while I was busy pouring another glass of Dom Pérignon down Vanessa’s throat two miles away.
The Maybach screeched to a halt at the grand marble steps of my mansion. Before the vehicle had even fully settled, Alexander yanked the door open and sprinted up the steps. The front doors—automatically unlatched by his remote override—swung inward with a heavy groan.
The foyer was dead silent, save for the rhythmic dripping of water from a broken vase near the grand piano. And then Alexander saw it. A dark, tacky trail of crimson smeared across the pristine white Carrera marble, leading from the base of the majestic dual staircase down into the shadows of the hallway.
—Here! —Alexander shouted, dropping to his knees.
Emily lay crumpled near the bottom pillar, her pale face stark against the dark blood pooling beneath her. Her fingers were still curled claw-like around her shattered iPhone, the screen glowing faintly with the last dialed outgoing call: Alexander Hayes.
Dr. Thorne and the nurses rushed past him within seconds, setting up a portable IV line and slipping an oxygen mask over Emily’s colorless lips. Thorne pressed two fingers against her throat, his eyes darting down to her swollen abdomen.
—Her pulse is thready. Blood pressure is crashing hard. She’s gone into hemorrhagic shock, —Thorne barked, ripping open a plasma bag. —Prepare the stretcher. We need to intubate immediately and get her into the mobile surgical unit on the way to Mount Sinai.
Alexander leaned over Emily, gently brushing a lock of sweat-drenched hair away from her clammy forehead. His voice, usually cold and imperious in corporate boardrooms, cracked with a raw, buried agony.
—Emily. Can you hear me? Look at me.
Emily’s eyelids fluttered. A faint, agonizing groan escaped her lips, and her hand twitched, weakly catching the edge of Alexander’s sleeve.
—The... the baby... —she whispered, her voice like dry paper. —He... he didn't answer...
—I’m here, Emily. I’ve got you, —Alexander murmured, his grip on her hand tightening until his knuckles turned white. He looked up at Thorne with a look that could have shattered glass. —Save them both. Whatever it takes. If you lose either of them, the hospital, the grants, everything we’ve built—it burns.
As the medical team lifted Emily onto the stretcher and raced her out toward the waiting ambulance-van, Alexander stood slowly from the pool of blood on the marble floor. His gaze swept across the opulent, soulless foyer of my mansion—the glittering crystal chandelier, the expensive art, the champagne bucket still sitting on the side table from a party I had thrown the week before.
May you like
He pulled out his phone, dialed a private number, and spoke with terrifying calm.
—Find Michael. Drag him out of whatever club he’s wasting his life in. And make sure he knows that by the time the sun comes up, everything he thinks he owns belongs to someone else.
