CHAPTER 5: The Trap at the Wedding
CHAPTER 5: The Trap at the Wedding
The words on the wedding invitation echoed in everyone's mind.
"She survived once. She won't survive twice."
A heavy silence settled over the estate.
The bride felt her hands go numb as the invitation slipped from her fingers onto the white aisle.
"No..." she whispered.
"This can't be real."
The police officer carefully placed the invitation into an evidence bag.
"We've already secured the abandoned sedan," he said. "Our forensic team is processing fingerprints and DNA, but whoever left the vehicle knew exactly what they were were doing. There are almost no usable traces."
The government official turned immediately toward the officers.
"Lock down the estate."
"No one leaves."
"No one enters."
Within seconds, uniformed officers spread throughout the property.
The grand iron gates were closed.
Guests who had arrived expecting a celebration now found themselves standing inside what had become an active crime scene.
The groom looked around in disbelief.
"This is insane."
"We're treating my wedding like a police operation."
The chairman slowly turned toward him.
"No."
"We're treating it like an attempted murder."
Those words sent another wave of panic through the crowd.
Several guests immediately checked on their children.
Others gathered together, whispering nervously.
The bride stood motionless.
Her entire world had collapsed within a single hour.
She had learned that the man she was about to marry had deceived her.
She had discovered that the mysterious stranger who saved her life had spent twenty-two years protecting her from the shadows.
And now...
Someone wanted her dead.
She looked at the chairman.
"Why now?"
"Why wait twenty-two years?"
The chairman remained silent for a moment.
Then he answered.
"Because today..."
"...someone realized we finally found each other."
The bride frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"I kept my distance from you for decades."
"No one knew I was searching for you."
"But the moment I walked into this wedding..."
"...whoever has been watching us understood that the last living witness had finally returned."
The government official nodded.
"He's right."
"If the mastermind believed the chairman had remained hidden, there would have been no reason to act."
"But today's reunion changed everything."
The bride slowly realized what that meant.
"They're afraid."
The chairman looked at her proudly.
"Exactly."
"They aren't threatening you because they're powerful."
"They're threatening you because they're terrified."
Before anyone could continue, one of the detectives hurried toward the group.
"Sir."
"We've recovered surveillance footage from cameras outside the estate."
"Show me."
The detective opened a laptop.
Several video clips appeared on the screen.
The footage showed guests arriving throughout the afternoon.
Luxury cars entered one by one.
Families greeted one another.
Photographers unloaded equipment.
Everything looked normal.
Then...
The detective paused the video.
"There."
A black delivery van stopped outside the service entrance approximately two hours before the ceremony.
A man wearing a maintenance uniform stepped out carrying a large toolbox.
The wedding planner immediately pointed at the screen.
"I remember him."
"He said he was here to inspect the electrical system."
"Did anyone verify his identification?" the detective asked.
She slowly shook her head.
"He had paperwork."
"He looked official."
"He was only inside for about twenty minutes."
The detective zoomed in on the footage.
The man's face remained hidden beneath a baseball cap.
But something else caught everyone's attention.
As he climbed back into the van...
He looked directly toward one of the security cameras.
Then...
He smiled.
Not the smile of someone finishing a day's work.
The smile of someone who wanted to be seen.
The chairman's expression hardened.
"I know that smile."
The bride looked at him.
"You've seen him before?"
He nodded slowly.
"Not him."
"The man who trained him."
The detective frowned.
"What do you mean?"
The chairman took a deep breath.
"The organization behind the fire never relied on ordinary criminals."
"They recruited people."
"They taught them how to disappear."
"How to erase evidence."
"How to make deaths look accidental."
The guests listened in horrified silence.
The government official looked toward the detective.
"Search every inch of this property."
"I want bomb disposal units."
"I want every electrical room inspected."
"I want every guest accounted for."
"Move."
Within moments, dozens of officers spread across the estate.
The wedding had become a full-scale investigation.
The bride suddenly remembered something.
"The maintenance worker..."
"He walked behind the flower arch."
The wedding planner nodded.
"Only for a minute."
"I thought he was checking the lighting."
The chairman's face instantly changed.
"The arch."
He turned toward the officers.
"Get everyone away from it!"
The officers reacted immediately.
"Everyone back!"
"Move away from the ceremony!"
Guests rushed backward in confusion.
Some grabbed children.
Others abandoned handbags and cameras on the chairs.
The bomb squad sprinted toward the enormous floral arch where the bride and groom had been standing only an hour earlier.
One technician carefully examined the base.
Then another.
Thirty agonizing seconds passed.
Finally...
The lead technician slowly raised his hand.
"Sir..."
"We found something."
Every heart stopped.
He carefully pulled away several white flowers.
Hidden deep inside the metal frame...
Was a small black device connected to wires.
The technician's face turned pale.
"It's real."
The crowd erupted into screams.
Several guests burst into tears.
The bride instinctively grabbed the chairman's hand.
"If I had married him..."
She couldn't finish the sentence.
The chairman gently squeezed her hand.
"You wouldn't have walked away."
The technician continued examining the device.
After another tense minute, he spoke again.
"The timer never activated."
The detective frowned.
"Why not?"
"It wasn't designed to explode automatically."
He looked up.
"It required a remote signal."
A chilling realization swept through everyone.
Whoever planted the bomb...
Had planned to watch.
Had planned to choose the exact moment.
The exact second.
The exact victim.
The detective immediately issued another order.
"Search every rooftop."
"Search every nearby building."
"If someone intended to trigger this remotely..."
"They couldn't have gone far."
Police vehicles raced through the surrounding streets.
Helicopters could already be heard approaching overhead.
As the chaos unfolded, the chairman quietly reached into the inside pocket of his borrowed jacket.
He removed a small velvet pouch.
The bride looked at him curiously.
"What is that?"
He opened it.
Inside was a tiny silver locket.
Blackened around the edges from fire.
"I found this the night I saved you."
The bride stared at it in disbelief.
Her breathing became uneven.
"My mother..."
"She wore that every day."
The chairman nodded.
"I kept it because I hoped..."
"One day..."
"I could return it to you."
With trembling hands, the bride accepted the locket.
She slowly opened it.
Inside were two tiny photographs.
One showed her as a baby in her mother's arms.
The second...
Made her freeze.
A family portrait.
Taken only weeks before the fire.
But this copy was different.
Standing behind her parents...
Almost hidden in the shadows...
Was the same gray-haired man from the surveillance footage.
This time, however, his face wasn't blurred.
It was perfectly clear.
The government official stared at the photograph.
His eyes widened.
"I know this man."
The chairman looked up sharply.
"You do?"
The official nodded slowly.
"I've seen him before..."
He swallowed hard.
"Not in an old investigation."
He pointed toward the photograph with a trembling finger.
"I met him..."
"...three months ago."
The bride's heart pounded.
"Where?"
The official hesitated.
Then answered with words that left everyone speechless.
"He wasn't hiding."
"He was sitting in the front row..."
"...at a government anti-corruption conference."
The chairman closed his eyes.
After twenty-two years...
The man responsible for destroying countless lives had not disappeared.
He had simply built himself a new identity.
A more powerful one.
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And now...
The hunt had finally begun.
