Chapter 4 - The Hospital
Daniel didn’t stay in the mansion.
He called 911.
Margaret tried to stop him.
“You’re making this worse.”
Daniel stared at her.
“For who?”
“Daniel.”
“You kicked a baby.”
“He lost his balance.”
“I watched the end of it.”
“You did not see what happened.”
Daniel looked at Noah.
His son was still crying.
“That’s why cameras exist.”
Margaret stopped.
It lasted less than a second.
But Daniel saw it.
At Greenwich Hospital, doctors examined Noah.
Daniel stood beside the bed while a pediatric specialist checked him.
No fracture.
No internal bleeding.
Bruising.
A mild concussion that required observation.
Daniel sat down.
He pressed his face into his hands.
“Thank God.”
Noah reached toward him.
Daniel immediately lifted him.
“I’m here.”
A police detective arrived twenty minutes later.
Detective Maria Ramirez.
Margaret had already called police too.
Her version was simple.
Noah fell.
Daniel became hysterical.
Daniel attacked her.
The detective asked:
“Did you slap your mother?”
“Yes.”
Ramirez looked surprised by how quickly he admitted it.
“I’m not going to lie.”
“Why did you strike her?”
“She said my fifteen-month-old deserved to be kicked down a staircase.”
Ramirez wrote something.
“Did you see her kick him?”
“I saw Noah falling. I saw her standing above him.”
“Any witnesses?”
“No.”
“Security cameras?”
Daniel nodded.
“The mansion has them.”
His phone rang.
Margaret.
He rejected it.
She called again.
Then sent a text.
Come home before you ruin everything.
Daniel showed Ramirez.
The detective photographed it.
Another message came.
The child is fine. Stop being dramatic.
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
Then:
Your father would be ashamed of you.
Daniel laughed once.
Coldly.
“My father?”
He suddenly remembered something.
Henry had upgraded the mansion security system shortly before his death.
Daniel had complained because Henry insisted on redundant recording.
Local server.
Cloud backup.
Off-site corporate mirror.
Margaret controlled the local system.
But not necessarily the other two.
Daniel called Carter Global’s security director.
“This is Daniel Carter.”
“Mr. Carter.”
“I need access to my father’s old residential security mirror.”
There was silence.
Then:
“Sir, Mrs. Carter requested that archive be destroyed last month.”
Daniel looked at Detective Ramirez.
“Was it?”
“No.”
May you like
Daniel closed his eyes.
His father had left another piece of protection behind.
