My Daughter Is In A Coma After Her Husband Cut Her Brake Lines For A $10m Payout. He Didn’t Know She Was Pregnant With His Child. I Am A Billionaire With A Very Particular Set Of Skills. How Should I Execute My Revenge?
The Call in the Night
The call came at 3:47 in the morning. I was already awake. At 63, sleep doesn’t come easy anymore. I was sitting in my study in Boston reviewing quarterly reports from the foundation when my phone lit up with a number I didn’t recognize.
“Mr. Thornton, this is Dr. Patricia Chen at Cedar Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.”
My blood turned cold before she even finished the sentence.
“Your daughter, Mrs. Rebecca Mercer, was brought in two hours ago. She’s in critical condition. You need to come immediately.”
I didn’t ask questions. I didn’t pack a bag. I grabbed my wallet, my phone, and I was in my car within four minutes. My private pilot met me at the airstrip by 4:30. We were wheels up by 5.
For five hours, I sat in that plane watching the sun rise over America. And I thought about my daughter, my Rebecca. The little girl who used to climb onto my lap and ask me to read her stories.
The woman who graduated Summa Cum Laude from Stanford. The brilliant attorney who gave up her career to support her husband’s dreams. Her husband, Derek Mercer. The man I had welcomed into my family eight years ago.,
The man I had funded, mentored, trusted. The man who was supposed to protect my daughter. Where was he? I called his phone 17 times during that flight. Every call went straight to voicemail.
The Hospital Vigil
When I landed at Van Nuys Airport, I didn’t wait for a car service. I took a taxi directly to Cedar Sinai. I ran through those hospital corridors like a man half my age. And when I found the ICU, I pushed past the nurse’s station without stopping.
“Sir, you can’t just…”
“My daughter, Rebecca Mercer. Where is she?”
A young nurse looked at her computer.
“Room 412. But sir, visiting hours…”
I was already gone. Room 412 was at the end of a long hallway. The door was partially open. I pushed it wider, and what I saw stopped me dead in my tracks.
My daughter lay motionless on that hospital bed. Tubes ran in and out of her body. Machines beeped and hummed around her. Her face was swollen, bruised, barely recognizable. Her left arm was in a cast. Her head was wrapped in bandages.
I couldn’t breathe. I walked to her bedside and took her hand. It was cold. Too cold.,
“Rebecca,” I whispered. “Daddy’s here. Daddy’s here, sweetheart.”
She didn’t respond. She couldn’t. She was in a medically induced coma.
A doctor appeared behind me. Dr. Chen, I assumed. She was a small woman with kind eyes and a grave expression.
“Mr. Thornton, I’m so sorry. Your daughter suffered severe trauma, multiple fractures, internal bleeding, and significant brain swelling. We had to operate immediately to relieve the pressure.”
“What happened to her?”
“The police report says it was a car accident. Her vehicle went off Mulholland Drive around 1 a.m. She wasn’t found until almost an hour later.”
“Where is her husband? Where is Derek?”
Dr. Chen hesitated.
“We haven’t been able to reach him. The emergency contact number on file goes to voicemail.”
I felt something dark twist in my chest.
“What do you mean you can’t reach him? He’s her husband. He should be here.”
“We’ve left multiple messages, Mr. Thornton. I’m sorry. We thought perhaps you could find him.”
I said, “Yes, I’ll find him.”,
The Search for Derek
I stepped outside the room and made a phone call. Not to Derek, to Vincent Russo, my head of security for the past 20 years. A former FBI agent who now ran a private investigation firm that I had helped establish.
“Vincent, I need you in Los Angeles. Now.”
“What’s wrong, Marcus?”
“Rebecca is in the hospital, critical condition, and Derek is missing.”
There was a pause.
“I’ll be there in six hours. In the meantime, I’ll have my LA team start looking.”
“Find him, Vincent. Find him and find out what happened to my daughter.”
I hung up and walked back into that hospital room. I pulled a chair next to my daughter’s bed, and I held her hand and I waited. Three hours later, Vincent called back.
“I found him.”
“Where?”
“Marina Del Rey. He’s on a yacht called the Golden Hour. It’s owned by a woman named Vanessa Callaway.”
“Who is Vanessa Callaway?”
Another pause. Longer this time.
“Marcus, you might want to sit down for this.”
“Just tell me, Vincent.”
“Vanessa Callaway is Derek’s mistress. Has been for at least two years. She’s a real estate developer, very wealthy, and right now, according to the Instagram story she posted an hour ago, she and Derek are celebrating their engagement.”,
The world tilted.
“Their what?”
“Engagement, Marcus. Derek Mercer proposed to Vanessa Callaway last night around midnight. According to the timestamp, about an hour before your daughter’s accident.”
