Chapter 2 - NINE MINUTES OF DARKNESS
"Disabled manually?" Daniel repeated. His voice carried across the shattered greenhouse, reaching Vanessa before the technician could answer. Evelyn was still on the floor, Maya kneeling protectively beside her.
The technician, Oliver Price, swallowed. "Someone used the control terminal, sir. I can't tell you who from here." His eyes shifted toward the security room at the end of the corridor.
Daniel immediately asked him to preserve the access logs and stop anyone from touching the equipment. Maya nodded in approval without leaving Evelyn, whose breathing grew steadier beneath Daniel's jacket.
"The lights are disconnected," a venue attendant called from the distant electrical panel. Only then did the remaining guests begin moving past the doors, guided away from the slippery wreckage.
Vanessa tugged free of the harmless strands caught around her shoes. "This is absurd," she snapped. "You're investigating a recording system instead of your hysterical fiancée. Look at what her friend did."
Maya stood slowly. Her cheek still burned, but her voice remained controlled. "I watched you pull Evelyn down. You slapped me, picked up cutting shears, and came at us."
"You shoved me into a shelf," Vanessa replied. "I could have died." Maya glanced at the broken pots. "After you brought sharp metal toward a woman protecting an injured bride."
Daniel stepped between them before another argument could begin. He looked directly at Vanessa, recalling years of smaller humiliations he had excused as sharp humor or harmless family rivalry.
"Leave the greenhouse," he said. "Please don't make me ask twice." Vanessa's composure cracked. She opened her mouth to invoke their dead father, then saw Daniel would not yield.
Two paramedics entered carrying a medical bag. They assessed Evelyn, checked for signs of a serious head injury, and helped her onto a stretcher after she complained of dizziness.
The veil lay abandoned on the floor. Evelyn stared at the train trailing behind the stretcher, its embroidered roses twisted through broken stems. She had sewn one tiny blue thread into its hem for luck.
"I don't want it," she whispered. Maya bent down, untangled the surviving section, and folded it without making Evelyn watch. "Then you don't have to carry it today."
Daniel climbed into the ambulance with Evelyn. Maya followed them in her car after giving the responding officer her contact information and a clear account of what she had witnessed.
At the hospital, a doctor cleaned Evelyn's small scalp injury, checked her shoulder, and evaluated her dizziness. The assessment was reassuring, though she received instructions to watch for worsening symptoms.
Daniel sat beside the bed, holding her hand while a monitor traced a patient heartbeat across the dim room. For the first time that morning, the wedding music existed only in memory.
"I saw her smile," Evelyn said at last. "When she pulled the veil, she smiled like she'd finally reached the moment she'd been planning." She shut her eyes against another wave of shame.
Daniel leaned closer. "I should have listened when you said she was getting worse." Evelyn shook her head. "You weren't there. You can't carry what she chose to do."
He remembered Vanessa describing Evelyn as an opportunist after their engagement. He remembered Evelyn quietly changing tables at family dinners, apologizing for arguments she had never started.
"I made excuses because she was my sister," Daniel admitted. "I thought keeping the peace protected everyone." Evelyn looked at him. "Peace that only one person has to pay for isn't peace."
Maya arrived carrying a paper bag of warm clothes and Evelyn's phone. Her cheek had begun to bruise faintly, and she seemed more offended by the injury than frightened by it.
"The hospital made me promise I wouldn't start an argument in the parking lot," Maya said. Evelyn managed a weak smile, the first one Daniel had seen since the morning collapsed.
Then Maya placed her own phone on the bed. "I didn't film the beginning," she explained, "but a guest sent me part of what happened. I haven't shown anyone else."
The video opened on the aftermath of Evelyn's fall. Vanessa stood holding the torn veil, speaking down at her. Maya entered, and the clip captured the slap and the rush toward the shears.
Daniel watched without moving. In the final seconds, a flower arrangement blocked the view of Maya pushing Vanessa backward, but the violence that came first was unmistakable.
"We need the original file," he said. Maya nodded. "I told the guest not to edit it or post it. She's keeping the version recorded on her phone."
An incoming message interrupted them. It came from Catherine Whitmore, Daniel and Vanessa's mother. Her words were elegant, formal, and so carefully chosen that Evelyn felt cold reading them.
"I trust this family matter can be resolved privately before any permanent damage occurs." Daniel typed a reply while both women watched. "Evelyn was attacked. That damage has already occurred."
Catherine did not answer. A few minutes later, Daniel's phone rang from an unknown number. He stepped into the corridor, expecting a reporter or another concerned relative.
A woman's anxious voice spoke before he could identify himself. "I'm Nora Bell. I work in accounting for the Whitmore Foundation. Your sister has been asking about the greenhouse invoices."
Daniel frowned. "Why would that matter now?" Nora hesitated long enough for him to hear traffic passing on her end. "Because Evelyn questioned two payments last week. Vanessa was furious."
The call ended abruptly. Daniel tried returning it, but there was no answer. He stood beneath the hospital's fluorescent lights, remembering Evelyn's work on the greenhouse restoration.
She had noticed mismatched figures and assumed they were bookkeeping mistakes. Vanessa, the foundation's finance director, had personally insisted that Evelyn leave all financial questions to the family.
Daniel returned to the room and found Evelyn holding the folded corner of her damaged veil. The sight made the next question difficult, but he asked it anyway.
May you like
"Evelyn, what exactly did you discover in those restoration invoices?" Her gaze lifted toward him, and something deeper than physical pain crossed her face.
"Enough," she answered quietly, "that your sister asked me not to marry you until I promised to forget it."
