Then, after the grenade had exploded, blowing out the windows of the trailer and blasting Taylor and his father across the narrow room, Porter had reiterated his dark intention, stating that they were now engaged in a “kill or be killed” dynamic with One World.
Would Porter Montgomery really go so far as to kill Rose Cole?
Making matters worse was that Carter and his girlfriend, Layla, two members of One World, had taken his medical records to the press, the aftermath of which had yet to come crashing down all around him.
If Porter was using the fact that One World had stolen personal information on him to sell to the media as his twisted reason for lashing out violently, then why had he targeted Rose and not Carter and Layla, who were the true culprits of the destruction to the Starlight pipeline?
What was this really about?
As far as Taylor could see, the only reason would be that Taylor was falling in love with Rose. Did his father resent him so much that he had to take measures to harm the one woman whom Taylor felt he could truly love, possibly for the rest of his life?
He clenched his jaw at the thought, easing the bedroom door closed so that Rose could sleep in peace.
At the kitchen counter, he wrote her a note and set her new keycard on top of it. He didn’t like the idea of leaving her alone, but the fact of the matter was that, thanks to the locksmith, the only two people who now had access to his suite were he and Rose. Logic prevailed that she would be safe.
Downstairs in the lobby, Taylor met with the morning desk attendant, explaining that he now had a new keycard for his suite, but until further notice he would not provide the building manager with a copy. As always, the attendant indicated that he understood and didn’t question Taylor.
As he crossed the lobby, intent on driving out to Bellevue to confront his father, a man passing through the glass doors caught his eye.
Tall and in his mid-forties, with a thick head of salt-and-pepper hair and a steely glint in his hardened eyes, the man approached him with a sense of purpose. It was then that Taylor caught the silver badge clipped to his belt buckle.
“Mr. Montgomery?” he asked. “I’m Detective Tavaras from Homicide.”
“Detective,” he said, surprised. “Yes, thank you for coming.”
“I was hoping to speak with Rose, but you’ll do for the time being.”
“Certainly,” he said. “Anything I can do to help.”
Speaking discretely, the detective ushered him over to the far wall where the desk attendant overhear their conversation.
“There was a problem with the security footage.”
“A problem?” he asked. “I can get my technical department on it.”
“No, you don’t understand,” he said, interrupting him. “The problem was that someone stopped the cameras.”
“What?”
“The lobby footage, the elevator footage, and the footage from the fiftieth floor, a total of four cameras, as I understand it, all stopped at twenty-eight minutes prior to Rose Cole’s 9-1-1 call.”
“Stopped?”
“Meaning at 10:47 p.m., the footage stopped and didn’t resume recording until well after two in the morning.”
Detective Tavaras studied Taylor for a long moment before asking, “Who has access to your security room?”
“A number of people. I’d have to check the schedule to let you know who was working last night.”
“Do that if you would. I’m going to need to talk to them. See if one of them flipped the switches or if they were asked to step out.”
“Jesus,” he said, knowing full well that if his father waltzed into the security room and ordered the guards on an impromptu break, they’d obey without question.
“This was a well-planned attack,” he concluded. “Is Rose around?”
“Yes, upstairs, but I’m not sure she’s awake yet.”
“No time like the present,” he said, offering a brittle smile that wavered. He struck Taylor as the type so hardened by the job that even the simple act of smiling was taxing.
“Sure, I’ll walk you up.”
Taylor was hesitant to leave Rose alone with Detective Tavaras, but once she got dressed and situated in the living room, she assured him she would be fine if left alone for a few hours. Though he worried it would make him look paranoid, he stole away into his office before leaving the suite in order to call the Seattle precinct and confirm Tavaras’s badge number, all of which checked out.
He laughed at himself, shaking his head as he returned to the living room. His father’s reach was far and wide, but not everyone in Seattle was prone to his spell, and Taylor knew he’d overreacted.
“I’ll be back in a few,” he told Rose, who was setting out a mug of coffee for the detective on the coffee table as she lowered onto the couch.
She smiled then waved him off, as Detective Tavaras commented at how adapted she had become to her loss of eyesight.
The drive out to Bellevue felt long and arduous, as Taylor clumsily maneuvered his Lexus, weaving badly with the heavy flow of traffic and nearly colliding with each vehicle he intended to pass. All the while, he clutched the wheel in a white-knuckle grip, his mind racing at the things he might say to his father.
Should he have mentioned to Detective Tavaras that he suspected his very own father had been behind Rose’s attack? Why hadn’t he? Why had he held his tongue when Rose’s safety was ultimately in his hands? Wouldn’t he do anything to keep her safe? He had certainly said so time and again, but Taylor realized that his emotions were becoming tangled. He had his issues with Porter Montgomery, but the man was his father. Taylor knew he was truly resisting the possibility that Porter could’ve done this. Maybe Taylor was being cowardly, but a part of him hoped the detective would discover someone else had been behind the attack.
But if he really felt that way, if that was the highest hope he was holding, then what would he say to his father? What was the point of making the drive, other than to tend to business, as usual, proceeding with the pipeline, working with Davey Construction, and seeing to it that their new, eco-friendly materials and chemicals were getting installed safely in the ground throughout Bellevue?
Complicating matters was the fact that Taylor had committed himself to doing everything in his power to help Rose regain her sight. He had more specialists to call. He had to schedule more tests and physical therapy to see if Rose might be able to strengthen the muscles behind her eyes. Most importantly, he had promised himself to delve into the overwhelming task of finding eye donors all on his own.
It was true that money could buy anything, but using it to inspire a person to part with their very own eyes was a daunting endeavor.
By the time Taylor was pulling up in his parking spot beside the trailer at the Starlight pipeline, he felt thoroughly overwhelmed and ready to snap. It wouldn’t be the best way to approach his father, so he took a few deep breaths, letting the engine cool now that he’d drawn the key out and tucked it into the sun visor over his head.
When he finally did get out of his Lexus, he walked over to the stack of pipes set yards back from the trench. Construction workers bid him good morning as he passed. He nodded in response, though his gaze was locked on the new materials. To the naked eye, they appeared to be the new, platinum-coated steel cylinders that Rose had advocated for. When he stopped by seven chemical barrels and waved the construction manager over, he could tell by the labeling on the side of each barrel that it was also the correct, eco-friendly material.
As he questioned the manager, a friendly guy who aimed to please, and as he tried to follow the man’s explanation, Taylor couldn’t help but feel pained at the look he remembered seeing on Rose’s face the night before.
She had barged in unannounced and with ironclad conviction alongside her attorney in order to deliver a plan that proposed he move the pipeline eight miles out. She had asserted with such passion that even with safe materials, the risk of a natural gas leak, or full-blown spill, would put the entire town
of Bellevue at risk since the pipeline ran perpendicular to the Bellevue water tower.
Rose had sacrificed so much for her cause—her eyesight and nearly her life.
Yet Taylor still hadn’t found the gumption to stand up to his father at all costs, move the pipeline off the grid as Rose had proposed, and make the one woman he cared about most in this world happy.
“Mr. Montgomery?” asked the construction manager, his sweat-red face puckering up into a confused smile.
“What?” he asked, suddenly embarrassed he had no idea where they were in the conversation.
“I asked how Rose was doing.”
Without warning, without so much as thinking, Taylor grabbed the man by the collar, demanding, “How do you know about Rose? Was it you? Who sent you?”
“We all know about her eyesight,” he explained frantically. “We know you two are close. It was just a question, sir. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
Breathing hard, Taylor loosened his grip and slowly backed away, mumbling apologies before making his quick way around the corporate trailer and up the steps, alarmed he could react so wildly.
As soon as he stepped inside, still rattled and unable to calm himself entirely, he locked eyes with Porter, who was drinking an espresso on the plush leather couch, as Lawrence, another executive, read aloud the timeline of the build.
“Why is it always too much to hope that you’ll show up on time?” Porter asked in a snide tone before taking a long sip of his coffee.
“Lawrence, out,” Taylor demanded without bothering to look at the man, who was clearly struck by the younger Montgomery’s intensity.
Porter flicked his dark eyes at Lawrence, who, after setting the report on the desk, rounded through the trailer, saying, “Good morning to you, too.” Then he stepped outside to give them privacy.
“Rose was attacked last night,” said Taylor. “What do you know about it?”
“Nothing.”
“I met with a detective this morning, Dad. He said someone stopped the security footage at the Escala.”
“That’s a shame.”
Taylor was breathing hard. Strong emotions made his throat swell and his temples started throbbing to see his father behave so nonchalantly about such a serious accusation.
“I hate to think you did this,” he pressed on. He wasn’t blind to the fact that his father was a ruthless and cruel man, but to stoop so low as to have Taylor’s girlfriend killed was truly evil. “But I don’t see who else it could be.”
“Watch yourself, Taylor,” he warned. “I don’t have a thing to do with the Escala. As far as the outsider’s perspective is concerned, Rose is just as much your enemy as she is mine.”
“Meaning...” Taylor didn’t need to wait for his father’s explanation. He had made his point all too clear. “You think I’m going to be suspected of this?”
“Why wouldn’t you be?”
Taylor glared at the man, who was taking all of this so lightly, he even found moments to gaze at the landscape through the blinds as though this was nothing more than a pleasant Thursday morning.
“I’ll tell you why,” he asserted, stealing his father’s attention. “Because Rose and I are on the same side.”
“That’s a joke.”
To drive his point home, Taylor yelled, “As of this moment, the Starlight Energy Project will begin digging a trench eight miles out.”
“You wouldn’t dare—”
“I’ll have the necessary permits in place by this afternoon. We’ll begin moving the materials tomorrow, and we’ll start building the day after that.”
“You’re going to waste millions of dollars to avoid attempted murder suspicions?”
He held his father’s gaze and grinned. “You didn’t leave me any other option.”
Launching to his feet, Porter advanced on him, and when they were nearly nose to nose, he shouted, “I didn’t do a thing to that woman.”
“No, I’m sure you sent someone else to do your dirty work. I’ll find out who. I’ll get them to spill. You’ll go down for this. And in the meantime, you’ll have to watch me take full control of this pipeline, and you won’t be able to do a thing to stop me.”
“You’re wrong about that,” he said, sneering through his teeth. “I’ve notified the board of your mental instability, which I’m sure the media will corroborate as soon as your medical records hit the news.”
Taylor held his ground, but couldn’t deny his father’s threat was striking him like a fist to his solar plexus.
“They’ll vote you off the project. I’ll be reinstated. You’ll be nothing more than a memory.”
“I won’t go down without a fight.”
“I’m not concerned with fighting you, Taylor. You aren’t very strong.”
“Get out.”
Porter raised his brows as though this entire exchange had been amusing before making his slow way to the door.
“I’ll give you some time to reconsider your choices,” he said after opening the door. “Don’t forget about your press conference at noon. You might want to use the few hours you have to compose your explanation for those medical records, because no one on my PR staff is going to help you. Not now. Psychosis,” he mused. “That’s a hard one to talk your way out of. And with your girlfriend having been attacked, why...I would be worried people are going to think you snapped, went into a psychotic rage, and tried to kill her. She doesn’t know who did it, after all…because she’s blind.”
As soon as his father left and he was alone, Taylor collapsed onto the couch, planted his elbows on his knees, and plowed his fingers through his hair, beside himself. He had known about the press conference. It had been organized by the Montgomery Press Relations Department. The strategy was to invite the press in so that Taylor could disclose his time at the hospital. By introducing the fact before Carter could, he would be able to control public perception and hopefully preserve his reputation. All told, it was a good plan, but Taylor had been so focused on Rose that he hadn’t given a second thought to what he might say, since his father had assured him the PR staff would compose his speech.
He didn’t want to have to be dealing with this right now.
He felt crippled. This wasn’t even an uphill battle. It was a losing one, and he couldn’t help but feel like he had already lost.
Rising up from the couch, he told himself he had to be strong. He had to follow through with his threats. He had to show his father he was stronger than steel and just as impenetrable. So when he reached the desk, he dialed Detective Tavaras’s cell number.
The line opened up and he wasted no time explaining to the detective that he had every reason to believe that his father, Porter Montgomery, had been behind Rose’s attack. He detailed the threat Porter had made to him privately about how she needed to “disappear,” and if she didn’t leave on her own, Porter would see to it that she did. He also mentioned the likelihood that whoever had been working in the security room last night would’ve left the booth unattended should Porter suggest it.
The detective took the information down in stride and didn’t comment, and when Taylor got off the phone he launched into his next task—alerting Davey Construction that it would be moving the pipeline eight miles out.
The hours flew by and soon members and associates of the press were filling up outside where the Starlight executives had organized a team to set up a table and rows upon rows of folding chairs to stage the press conference.
Finally, Taylor had the impulse to call Rose.
She picked up on the first ring, since he had helped her set a unique ringtone to all of his contact numbers.
“Taylor?” she asked, concerned to be hearing from him while he was at work.
“Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Are you?”
“I don’t know.” After a brief pause, he said, “I’m going to have a limousine pick you up. Can you be downstairs in five minutes?”
“Five?” she asked, dau
nted.
“Ten? I have an important announcement, and I need you here with me. If you could get the other members of One World to the site, that would be great. I know how I might be able to steer this press conference in my favor, but it won’t be easy.”
After he hung up, he quickly dialed his limo driver and instructed him to pick up Rose and drive her out to Starlight, then returned his cell to his suit’s inner pocket and pulled Rose’s contract out of the lap drawer on his desk.
If his father wanted to fight dirty, then he would hit him where it hurts.
Chapter Twenty
When Rose stepped out of the limousine, she was confronted with how loud the crowd was. A drone of echoing voices billowed across the dusty construction site, indicating the press conference was twelve yards up the trench.
Intimidated and having refused the white cane that Dr. Fitzpatrick had offered her during her last appointment where he sealed her fate that she would never see due to the most critical optical nerves having been damaged beyond repair, Rose hesitated to venture towards the commotion. Thankfully, Hector and Jenny, two trusted members of One World, approached, calling out her name.
“I’m glad you both could make it,” she said.
“Of course,” said Hector, taking her arm. “It looks like everyone is gathered this way.”
“What’s all this about?” Jenny asked curiously.
“Truth be told, I’m not sure,” she said, as they made their way towards the crowd. “How many people are here?”
After a brief moment, he said, “It looks like five media outlets, and I’d say about two hundred people.”
Jenny then interjected, “I’d peg them as residents of Bellevue. Oh, there are some vacant chairs up in the second row.”
“Is Taylor up there?” asked Rose, as Hector helped her into her seat then Jenny sat beside her.
“Yeah,” she said. “And a few executives, it looks like.”
Hector leaned in close to her ear and said, “Carter and Layla are across the aisle.”
Rose drew in a deep breath. Of course they were here. It wasn’t enough that Carter had disregarded her and gone to the press with Taylor’s medical records. The self-serving couple had to show up and see the fruit of their destruction. How any of this would help One World’s cause was beyond her, but something told Rose that Carter and Layla’s motivation had less to do with their organization and more to do with themselves, but just precisely how, she had yet to find out.
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