Chapter 12 - Harbor Point Burns
Smoke was already rising when they reached the waterfront.
Workers were evacuating.
Fire alarms screamed across the site.
Daniel stared upward.
The west tower.
Twenty-two unfinished stories.
Flames near the lower mechanical level.
“Where’s Evelyn?”
Brooks pointed.
“Agents found Voss’s van.”
Empty.
Daniel moved toward the building.
Brooks grabbed him.
“No.”
“I know the tower.”
“So do firefighters.”
“I designed the emergency stair routing.”
“You are not going inside.”
Then Claire’s phone rang.
Evelyn.
Claire answered immediately.
“Mom!”
Static.
Then coughing.
“Claire.”
“Where are you?”
“In the building.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“What floor?”
Claire put the phone on speaker.
“Mom, what floor?”
“I don’t know.”
“Concrete room.”
“No windows.”
Daniel thought.
“Ask what she sees.”
“Mom, look around.”
“Pipes.”
“Numbers.”
“What numbers?”
“P-four.”
Daniel looked at the tower.
“Parking level four.”
Brooks relayed it.
Firefighters entered.
Evelyn whispered, “He chained the door.”
Claire began crying.
“They’re coming.”
“No.”
“Mom.”
“Listen.”
Evelyn coughed.
“Voss is still here.”
Daniel froze.
“Why?”
“I heard him.”
“He said the charges are set.”
Charges.
Not merely fire.
Daniel grabbed Brooks.
“He rigged demolition explosives.”
Brooks radioed bomb technicians.
Workers were moved farther back.
The fire department began withdrawing.
Claire screamed into the phone.
“You can’t leave her!”
Daniel looked at the plans in his mind.
Parking level four.
Concrete storage room.
Service access.
“There’s another entrance.”
Brooks stared.
“Where?”
“Utility shaft from P-three.”
“Tell firefighters.”
She did.
A rescue team rerouted.
Minutes stretched.
Evelyn’s breathing worsened.
Madison was not present.
For once, Claire was grateful.
She was under guard miles away.
Then the line went dead.
“Mom?”
Nothing.
Claire broke.
Daniel held her.
Thirty seconds later a firefighter’s voice came through the command radio.
“Victim located.”
Claire collapsed against Daniel.
Alive.
Evelyn was carried out five minutes later.
Oxygen mask.
Burns on one arm.
Barely conscious.
She reached toward Claire.
“I’m sorry.”
Claire held her hand.
“Later.”
Brooks approached.
“Where is Voss?”
Evelyn’s eyes moved.
“Top.”
“What?”
“He went up.”
Daniel stared at the tower.
Voss was still inside.
Then an agent shouted.
“Movement on level nineteen.”
A figure appeared near the exposed edge.
Nathan Voss.
He held something in his hand.
A remote trigger.
Brooks ordered everyone back.
Daniel studied the tower.
He understood the structure better than anyone alive.
If charges had been placed around the temporary support columns, detonation could cause partial progressive collapse.
Hundreds of responders were within range.
“Tell everyone to clear the east side.”
Brooks relayed the order.
Voss disappeared from view.
Then Daniel saw another figure behind him.
Ryan.
He was supposed to be in surgery.
Yet there he stood on the nineteenth floor.
Bandaged.
Barely upright.
Daniel’s phone rang.
Ryan.
“Are you insane?”
Ryan laughed weakly.
“Probably.”
“How did you get there?”
“Left the hospital.”
“You were shot.”
“I noticed.”
“Get down.”
“Voss has the trigger.”
Daniel’s heart pounded.
“Do not play hero.”
“I’m not.”
Ryan’s voice changed.
“I’m cleaning up my mess.”
“You cannot clean this up by dying.”
A pause.
“Maybe not.”
Then Ryan whispered, “Tell Madison I’m sorry.”
“Tell her yourself.”
The call ended.
On the nineteenth floor, Ryan stepped toward Voss.
Voss held the detonator.
“You should be dead.”
Ryan smiled.
“Runs in the family.”
Voss raised a gun.
Ryan stopped.
Below, police marksmen sought an angle.
No clear shot.
Daniel called his brother again.
Ryan answered without looking at the phone.
“Keep him talking.”
Ryan understood.
“You know what your problem is, Nathan?”
Voss laughed.
“Please enlighten me.”
“You never built anything.”
“I built an empire.”
“No.”
“You bribed people who built things.”
“You bought inspectors.”
“You bought politicians.”
“You bought me.”
Ryan’s voice broke.
“But you couldn’t buy Daniel.”
Voss’s face twisted.
“That sanctimonious little—”
Ryan moved.
Fast.
Voss fired.
The bullet struck Ryan high in the shoulder.
Ryan slammed into him.
The detonator flew across the floor.
Daniel shouted into the phone.
“RYAN!”
The two men fought near the open edge.
Ryan was weak.
Voss was stronger.
Then Voss reached for the detonator.
Ryan grabbed his leg.
Voss kicked him in the face.
A tactical officer appeared from the stairwell.
“DROP IT!”
Voss froze.
More agents flooded the level.
The detonator was secured.
Nathan Voss was handcuffed.
Ryan collapsed.
The tower did not explode.
For nearly twenty seconds Daniel could not breathe.
Then Brooks received the radio update.
“Voss in custody.”
“Mercer alive.”
Daniel lowered his head.
Claire took his hand.
For the first time since the chapel, the person trying to erase Daniel’s life was no longer free.
But the story was not finished.
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Because as bomb technicians cleared the building, they discovered one charge had already activated.
And its timer showed nine minutes.
