Chapter 14 - The Tower Beneath the Tower
Blackwood Tower occupied an entire block along the river.
Its glass exterior reflected the morning sky.
Its underground levels had been built during three separate expansions.
Only Charles knew the oldest sections completely.
Julian controlled the security system from Victor’s office.
He disabled elevators.
He locked fire doors.
He shut down mobile signals inside the building.
Employees remained trapped between floors.
Police surrounded the tower.
Julian warned that any forced entry would activate explosives placed near the underground medical suite.
Mercer could not confirm whether the explosives were real.
Victor assumed they were.
“He wants Ethan brought through the executive garage,” Victor said.
“He expects me to drive him inside.”
Mercer shook her head.
“We are not placing a child in his hands.”
“He will hurt Naomi and Thomas.”
“He may hurt them regardless.”
Lily stood beside Ethan’s hospital bed.
The boy watched the adults around him.
He understood fear even when no one explained it.
“He does not need Ethan,” Lily said.
“Not immediately.”
“Explain,” Mercer replied.
“The transplant requires preparation.”
“Julian would need Ethan sedated, tested, and medically cleared.”
“He cannot perform it during a police siege.”
Claire nodded.
“He needs access to stored blood or stem-cell material first.”
Victor looked toward her.
“Was anything collected when Ethan was born?”
“Umbilical-cord blood.”
“Where?”
“The Blackwood fertility program stored it.”
Charles spoke from his wheelchair.
“The storage vault is beneath the tower.”
Everyone turned.
Julian did not need Ethan for the first phase.
He needed the child present as leverage while he recovered the stored material.
The bomb threat kept authorities away.
The hostages forced Victor to cooperate.
“What else is beneath the tower?” Mercer asked.
Charles described an abandoned service level constructed before the modern building.
A river tunnel entered beneath the southern foundation.
The tunnel had been sealed after flooding.
Thomas Carter had used it during his investigation in 1998.
Victor looked at Lily’s father on the hostage video.
Thomas had known Julian might return there.
That was why Julian took him.
“He needs Thomas to locate something,” Lily said.
“The original identity report?” Mercer asked.
“No.”
Victor understood.
“My father said the original report was with prosecutors.”
“Julian believes Thomas kept another piece of evidence.”
Charles’s face tightened.
“He did.”
“What?”
“A recording.”
Charles looked toward Victor.
“Thomas secretly recorded Julian negotiating the shipping deal in 1998.”
“The tape included the name of Julian’s biological father.”
“Who was he?”
Charles answered after a pause.
“Richard Montigue.”
Serena’s maternal grandfather.
Julian was not merely unrelated to the Blackwoods.
He had been born into the Montigue family and inserted into the Blackwood household through falsified records.
The entire grievance he used to justify his crimes was false.
He had never been denied Blackwood blood.
He had stolen the name from the beginning.
“If the recording becomes public, he loses every remaining supporter,” Naomi’s assistant said.
“He also loses Serena’s belief that he was wronged.”
Lily looked toward the tower.
“Then he wants to destroy it.”
Charles nodded.
“Thomas hid it beneath the original service level.”
Mercer formed a plan.
Victor would enter through the executive garage with a medical transport vehicle.
A realistic pediatric mannequin would be placed inside Ethan’s carrier.
Lily opposed the plan.
“Julian knows Ethan’s face.”
“The carrier remains covered until Victor reaches the medical level,” Mercer said.
“That gives our team time.”
Victor would carry a transmitter hidden beneath his shirt.
Marco and Hargrove would enter through the river tunnel with federal agents.
Lily insisted on joining the tunnel team.
Victor refused.
Thomas was her father.
Naomi had protected her.
Lily refused to remain behind while both were hostages.
Victor looked at her cracked-rib scans.
“You can barely walk without pain.”
“I crawled across marble with Serena’s heel in my stomach.”
“I will manage a tunnel.”
Claire offered to stay with the children.
Lily kissed Ethan’s forehead.
“I am coming back.”
The boy touched her cheek.
“Li-Li.”
She forced herself to smile.
Victor watched them.
He no longer saw Lily as an employee.
He saw the person Ethan searched for whenever the room changed.
That truth created gratitude.
It also created fear.
Everyone close to Victor had become a target.
The executive garage opened when Victor’s vehicle approached.
He drove inside alone.
The carrier rested behind him beneath a blanket.
Peter’s voice came through the dashboard speaker.
“Place your phone on the passenger seat.”
Victor complied.
“Drive to elevator six.”
The elevator descended beyond the listed basement levels.
Victor stepped out carrying the covered carrier.
Peter waited with two armed men.
He searched Victor.
He did not find the transmitter sewn inside the jacket lining.
“Remove the blanket,” Peter said.
Victor looked toward the armed men.
“Julian said the medical suite.”
“Remove it.”
Victor pulled the blanket partially aside.
A recorded infant sound played from the mannequin.
The dim lighting concealed its face.
Peter reached toward it.
An alarm sounded above them.
Water had entered the south tunnel.
Peter looked toward the corridor.
Victor struck him.
The carrier fell.
One armed man fired.
Victor drove Peter into the wall.
The second man discovered the mannequin.
“It’s not the child.”
Peter attacked Victor with a surgical blade.
Victor caught his wrist.
They struggled near the open elevator shaft.
Marco’s team breached the lower corridor.
Gunfire echoed.
Peter pulled away and ran toward the medical suite.
Victor followed.
Inside, Julian stood beside the cord-blood storage chamber.
Naomi was tied near the wall.
Thomas sat inside a wheelchair connected to a heart monitor.
Julian held a gun against his neck.
“You brought me a doll.”
Victor stopped.
“You never needed Ethan.”
“I need his future cells.”
“The stored material will keep me alive until I can take the rest.”
“You built all of this to steal from children.”
“I built nothing.”
Julian’s face was pale.
“I used what your family already created.”
He removed a frozen storage case.
Alarms flashed around it.
Naomi spoke.
“The container will fail outside controlled transport.”
Julian aimed toward her.
“Then you will help me move it.”
Victor kept him talking.
“What does Thomas have?”
Julian looked toward Lily’s father.
“A lie recorded by a frightened investigator.”
“The truth that you were never a Blackwood.”
“I became more Blackwood than any of you.”
“You became everything our name deserved to lose.”
Julian’s control cracked.
He fired toward Victor.
Naomi pushed her chair into his arm.
The bullet struck the ceiling.
Victor lunged.
Thomas rolled his wheelchair toward the storage controls.
He struck the emergency release.
Liquid nitrogen vapor filled the room.
Lily entered through the tunnel door.
She reached Naomi.
Peter appeared behind her.
He wrapped one arm around Lily’s throat.
The blade pressed against her ribs.
Victor froze.
Julian regained his weapon.
“Everyone stop.”
Marco’s team remained outside the glass partition.
Julian held the storage case.
Peter held Lily.
Thomas’s monitor alarmed.
Naomi worked her hands free.
Julian looked toward Victor.
“You have spent your life pretending control is the same as strength.”
“Now choose.”
“The woman or the evidence.”
Peter pressed the blade harder.
Lily struggled to breathe.
Victor looked at the chamber controls.
Destroying the stored blood would remove Julian’s immediate goal.
It might also destroy medical material that could one day save Ethan.
Julian smiled.
“Decisions are simpler when every choice stains you.”
Victor reached slowly toward the control panel.
Then Thomas Carter spoke.
“The recording was never beneath the tower.”
Julian’s eyes shifted.
Thomas smiled weakly.
“I gave it to Amelia.”
Julian’s face emptied.
Peter looked toward him.
That distraction lasted less than a second.
Lily drove her heel into Peter’s knee.
Victor struck Julian.
Naomi activated the fire-suppression system.
Marco’s team broke through the glass.
Peter escaped into the vapor.
Julian dropped the storage case.
Lily caught it before it struck the floor.
Victor pinned Julian against the medical table.
Federal agents placed him in restraints.
For several seconds, no one moved.
Then Julian began laughing.
“You still think this ends with me.”
Mercer entered the suite.
“Where is Serena?”
Julian looked toward Lily.
“Ask the woman holding Ethan’s blood.”
Lily stared at the storage case.
A small red light blinked near the handle.
It was not only a medical container.
It contained a tracking device.
Before anyone could disable it, an explosion shook the upper floors.
The tower lights went dark.
Marco’s radio activated.
The hospital protecting Ethan had been attacked.
Claire was found unconscious.
Sophie remained in her room.
Ethan was gone.
Security footage showed the kidnapper.
May you like
Serena Montigue had not taken him.
Charles Blackwood had.
