Chapter 9 - Retaliation
I thought the law would be a shield. I was naive.
When a man like Richard Vance realizes his empire is turning to dust, the rules of polite society stop applying.
At eight o’clock that evening, I was alone in Dalia’s office. Dalia had gone down to the federal courthouse to deliver supplementary exhibits to Magistrate Reyes's clerk, and Marcus was across town verifying the offshore chain in the Caymans.
The midrise building was silent. Most of the other tenants—accountants, architectural firms, real estate agents—had cleared out for the night.
The elevator bell chimed softly at the end of the hall.
I looked up from the conference table, my pulse suddenly quickening. Dalia had her own keycard; she wouldn't need to buzz in from the elevator lobby.
I stood up, moving quietly toward the frosted glass doors of the suite.
Through the glass, I saw a tall, broad-shouldered silhouette. He didn't use a key. He pulled a heavy steel pry-bar from beneath his coat, jammed it into the gap between the double doors, and threw his full weight against it.
The deadbolt snapped with an explosive *crack* that echoed through the empty marble corridor.
Eli stepped through the shattered frame.
He wasn't wearing his suit anymore. He wore a dark tactical jacket, dark jeans, and leather gloves. His face was twisted into an expression of raw, unhinged fury I had never seen before—the face of a predator whose trap had snapped shut on his own leg.
"Where is it?" he hissed, stepping over the splintered wood.
I backed away toward the interior office, my hand searching behind me for anything—a heavy stapler, a letter opener, a lamp. "Stay back, Eli. The police have been monitoring this floor."
"The police?" Eli laughed, a jagged, terrifying sound as he kicked the conference room door wide open. "The police take orders from the men Dad pays. You think some little high-and-mighty lawyer is going to save you? Do you know what you did today?"
He closed the distance between us in three long strides. Before I could reach the heavy brass paperweight on the corner of the desk, his hand shot out, wrapping around my throat with military-honed strength, slamming me backward against the drywall.
The breath exploded from my lungs. The pain in my cracked ribs flared into white-hot agony.
"The Navy revoked my honorable discharge three hours ago," Eli snarled, his face inches from mine, his spittle landing on my bruised cheek. "They're convening a court-martial for Monday morning. My life is over, Cora! Twenty years of building a future, and you burned it down for what? For four million dollars?"
"It... wasn't... yours," I choked out, clawing at his gloved fingers, my vision swimming with gray spots.
"Everything Eleanor had was mine!" he screamed, his grip tightening until my airway completely shut off. "I was the son! I was supposed to take this family to Washington! You were just the mistake Dad had to keep quiet!"
My hand brushed against the corner of the small side table. My fingers wrapped around the handle of Dr. Chen’s heavy medical shears that had been left behind from changing my bandages.
I didn't hesitate. I didn't think about family, or bloodlines, or the little boy who used to catch fireflies with me on Pinerove Lane.
I drove the blunt-tipped stainless steel blade directly into Eli’s right thigh.
Eli let out a strangled roar of pain, his grip on my neck releasing instantly as he stumbled backward, clutching his leg where dark blood immediately began to soak through the denim.
I fell to my hands and knees, coughing violently, dragging air back into my starved lungs.
"You bitch!" Eli yelled, raising his hand to strike me down.
"Step away from her!"
The voice cracked like thunder through the broken doorway.
Marcus stood in the entrance, not with a laptop, but with a short-barreled Remington twelve-gauge shotgun leveled dead-center at Eli’s chest.
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"Move one more muscle, Captain," Marcus said, his voice flat, steady, and chillingly professional. "And they'll be picking your medals out of the drywall."
***
