Chapter 8 - THE DOORS DANIEL LOCKED
Daniel ordered every exit secured.
No guest was allowed to leave until the security footage was preserved and copied.
Victor stepped forward.
“You cannot detain forty respected people because your servant became emotional.”
Daniel placed himself between Hannah and the Beaumonts.
“She was assaulted.”
Claire touched her cheek as though she were the victim.
“She attacked me first.”
The recording proved otherwise.
Martin played the beginning of the confrontation on the ballroom screen.
Guests watched Claire order guards to block Hannah’s path.
They heard the threat about the baby surviving long enough to inherit.
Claire’s face became white.
Victor reached for Martin’s phone.
A Carver guard stopped him.
Daniel turned toward Hannah.
“Can you stand?”
She tried.
Pain tightened across her abdomen.
Daniel caught her before she fell.
“Call Dr. Salazar.”
The family physician arrived within minutes from the medical wing.
He examined Hannah behind a privacy screen in the library.
Her blood pressure was dangerously high.
The baby’s heartbeat remained present but irregular.
“She needs a hospital,” Dr. Salazar said.
Daniel carried Hannah toward the waiting vehicle.
Claire followed.
“Daniel, the trustees are here. If you leave, the signing fails.”
He stopped.
For months, the alliance had been presented as the only way to save his employees and prevent a war with rival families.
Now Claire stood beside the woman she had threatened while mentioning contracts.
Daniel looked at Victor.
“The merger is canceled.”
Victor’s voice became low.
“You do not have the votes to cancel it.”
Daniel held up the ultrasound.
“If this child is mine, I do.”
Claire rushed forward.
“She slept with someone else after leaving you.”
Hannah looked at Daniel through tears.
“I never left you.”
He froze.
Martin handed him the forged messages.
Daniel read both.
His face changed with each line.
He looked at Claire.
“You separated us.”
“She was distracting you from your duty.”
“You threatened her mother.”
“I protected the alliance.”
Daniel opened the vehicle door.
“No. You protected what you planned to steal.”
At the hospital, Dr. Salazar ordered immediate monitoring.
Daniel remained outside the room until Hannah asked for him.
He entered slowly.
Her hair had been trimmed unevenly around her face to remove the damaged sections.
She looked fragile.
She did not look powerless.
Daniel sat beside the bed.
“I need to ask you something.”
Hannah turned away.
“The baby is yours.”
His breath left him.
“You’re certain?”
“I knew the dates before I knew the lies.”
Daniel covered his face.
Months of grief, anger, and forced duty collapsed inside him.
Then a nurse entered with the laboratory forms.
Hannah had already completed a noninvasive prenatal paternity test weeks earlier.
Claire had forced the clinic to withhold the result.
The electronic file had just been recovered.
Probability of paternity: 99.99%.
Daniel looked at the screen.
Then at Hannah.
“You tried to tell me.”
May you like
“I tried to survive long enough to tell you.”
👉 Daniel had found his child, but the medical file revealed someone had attempted to alter Hannah’s treatment records that very morning.
