CHAPTER 12: The Roof
Eleanor had followed Daniel to the building against security instructions.
She believed Malcolm might surrender if he saw her.
Instead, he had found her near the rear entrance and forced her onto the roof.
Rain swept across the old building.
Malcolm stood near the edge with one arm around Eleanor and the gun pressed against her side.
Daniel emerged from the stairwell.
“Let her go.”
Malcolm laughed.
“You always choose her.”
“She’s my mother.”
“She was my mother’s child too. She received the name, the company, and the life I should have had.”
Eleanor remained calm.
“Our mother failed you, Malcolm. Our father failed you. I failed you when I believed a position in the company could replace a family.”
“You expect an apology to fix forty years?”
“No.”
“Then why are you here?”
“To tell you that what happened to you was wrong.”
Malcolm’s eyes filled with rage.
“But what you did afterward was your choice.”
He tightened his hold on her.
Eleanor continued.
“You framed me. You betrayed Thomas. You endangered innocent employees. You built your entire life around proving that you had been denied power.”
Her voice softened.
“But the moment you gained power, you treated people exactly as our father treated you.”
Malcolm’s hand began to tremble.
Daniel stepped closer.
“Give me the gun.”
“You think you’re better than me?”
“No. I think I still have time to avoid becoming you.”
For a moment, Malcolm looked exhausted rather than dangerous.
Then he raised the gun toward Daniel.
Victoria appeared at the roof entrance.
“Malcolm!”
He turned instinctively.
Eleanor drove her elbow into his arm.
The gun fired into the air.
Daniel pulled his mother away while agents tackled Malcolm to the wet concrete.
As they placed him in handcuffs, Malcolm looked toward Eleanor.
“You will lose the company anyway.”
“No,” she replied. “But even if I did, it would not make you innocent.”
Agents led him toward the stairwell.
Daniel held his mother tightly.
Then Eleanor’s body suddenly went limp.
She collapsed in his arms.
At the hospital, the doctors discovered internal bleeding caused by injuries from the warehouse fire.
Daniel waited outside the operating room for five hours.
Shortly after midnight, a surgeon walked toward him.
May you like
His expression revealed nothing.
“Mr. Mercer,” he said, “we need to discuss your mother’s condition.”
