An attempted suicide was already serious enough. When you added suspected group drug use to the mix, the severity skyrocketed.
The operator who took the call jumped, instantly wide awake. He quickly confirmed the details with Hector Donovan.
He also urged Hector Donovan to be extremely careful and to protect himself, adding that if the report proved true, they would contact him again.
Hector Donovan hung up and looked up to meet the intense gazes of the three other Donovans.
Mr. and Mrs. Donovan were beaming with approval, feeling their second son had handled the matter splendidly. Arabella Donovan, on the other hand, looked merely curious and confused.
"Hector, how did you know she'd taken illegal drugs? Or that there was more than one person in the room she mentioned? Did you suspect she was lying to you?"
Hector put on a knowing expression and nodded. "Her condition seemed really off, and she kept repeating the same things over and over. When I offered to have someone pick her up, she was very resistant. I can't explain it exactly; it was just a gut feeling that something was wrong everywhere. This industry is a mess. I've heard Webb mention before how some people act after taking that stuff, and it sounded a lot like her condition just now."
"At the very least, her crying and threatening suicide had to be real, right? I was just voicing my suspicions. It's the police's job to investigate and confirm. So this doesn't count as filing a false report. If I'm wrong, it's just a false alarm, which is far better than letting a criminal get away because of negligence."
"As for how I knew there was more than one person in her room," Hector Donovan said with a mysterious smile, "I have a unique talent. I'm exceptionally sensitive to the sound of people breathing. I can even hear how many people are on the other end of the line, right through the phone."
"Even though Fawn Nicholson was crying her eyes out, it wasn't enough to completely drown out the sounds of the others breathing. And yet, she claimed she was all alone…"
Fawn Nicholson was the actress who had just called Hector Donovan. A flicker of astonishment crossed Arabella Donovan's eyes. "So, Hector, you knew she was lying to you from the start?"
Hector answered without a trace of guilt. "Yep!"
"So you weren't the least bit curious? You never even considered going to check it out yourself, like she asked?"
"Are you kidding me? Go there myself?" Hector immediately looked appalled.
"If she were just making empty threats, that would be one thing. But if she was actually trying to kill herself, not only would I be unable to save her by going over, I might walk right in on the scene. I'd never be able to talk my way out of that. Calling the police is the safest bet. Professional matters should be left to the professionals. Why should we stick our noses in it?"
Arabella Donovan furrowed her brow, growing even more puzzled.
'Hector's head is on pretty straight, isn't it? So why was he such an idiot in the original story, believing every little thing people told him?'
Mr. and Mrs. Donovan's probing gazes shot toward him. Hector lifted his chin, thinking defiantly, 'That's definitely not my fault. I would never be that stupid!'
Given that illegal drugs were involved, the police moved with incredible speed.
Before Hector Donovan and his family had even finished dinner, the phone rang again. Hector was asked to come down to the police station to give a statement.
Hector Donovan had been expecting this. He agreed readily and got up to leave.
Not to be left out, Mr. and Mrs. Donovan chimed in, "Let's go. We'll all go together."
Arabella Donovan, chopsticks still in hand, stared blankly at them. "Mom, Dad, you're…"
"This is a huge deal. How could we let Hector handle it all by himself? Of course the whole family has to go."
They had been away when Caspian Rhodes had dinner with Hector and the others. And while Hector had given them the gist of what happened in the private room when they got back, how could a secondhand story ever be as exciting as watching the drama unfold in person?
They especially couldn't fathom how their own small, slender daughter had managed to beat those towering bodyguards—each one twice her size—to a pulp.
Missing that golden opportunity had been galling. Now that another chance to watch the show had presented itself, they absolutely could not pass it up.
'…' 'Mom, that was so poorly phrased. Anyone who didn't know better would think the whole family was about to be locked up together!'
Ultimately, Arabella Donovan couldn't argue with her enthusiastic parents. Besides, she was genuinely curious about what happened, so she ended up taking a taxi to the police station with the other three.
As soon as the four of them walked through the main doors, they spotted a disheveled woman huddled in a corner, a jacket draped over her shoulders. This, presumably, was Fawn Nicholson, the star of the honey trap who had called Hector Donovan.
Seeing Hector Donovan arrive looking bright and energetic, Fawn Nicholson's expression twisted for a moment.
The officer interrogating her saw right through her and snapped, "What are you looking at? He was lucky he didn't fall into your trap. Who knows what kind of mess he'd be in otherwise. And now you're resentful because you didn't get to hurt him? You've got issues!"
Then, she turned to Hector Donovan, her tone softening considerably. "You're a big star, I hear? Have a seat. Sorry to make you come all the way down here so late. The main reason is that their statements are almost entirely about you."
Apparently, after taking Hector Donovan's call, the dispatcher had immediately mobilized all available officers in the vicinity to surround Room 1303.
To avoid tipping them off, a young officer whose voice sounded a bit like Hector Donovan's posed as a friend of Fawn Nicholson and knocked on the door.
When the people inside heard him introduce himself as a friend of Fawn Nicholson, they naturally assumed Hector Donovan had arrived. The moment the officer stepped inside, they attempted to incapacitate him.
Luckily, the officer was experienced and managed to dodge most of it; otherwise, he'd have been out cold on the floor.
This incident made it clear to the officers that this was no simple matter.
They immediately swarmed in and arrested everyone. The tools and drugs they'd planned to use on Hector Donovan were all confiscated.
"This woman is tight-lipped and won't say a thing. But the young thugs she called for backup? We barely had to bluff them and they spilled everything."
The female officer taking the statement paused, then summarized, "Our preliminary assessment is that this was a particularly vicious honey trap. Their plan was to lure you over on the pretext of a suicide attempt, knock you unconscious as soon as you arrived, and then take compromising photos with you. In addition, they prepared addictive drugs, which they planned to force you to take after the photos were taken, to make it easier to control you."
Mr. and Mrs. Donovan already knew most of this before they arrived, but hearing it laid out so plainly still made their tempers flare.
'Thank God Hector realized something was wrong, and thank God they had Arabella. Otherwise, their son's life would have been ruined!'
"Did she say why she did it?"
"She claims someone in her family is sick and she's short on cash. She figured you were the wealthiest person she had access to, so she decided to take a huge risk and go for a big score."
Hector Donovan scoffed, cutting straight to the heart of the matter. "It's not that simple. A minor actress like her couldn't easily get her hands on those kinds of drugs."
This was also a key focus of their investigation. The policewoman suddenly sat up straighter. "Are you suggesting there's someone else behind this? A mastermind? Do you have any enemies?"