Chapter 5 - BLOOD ON THE PARQUET
Evelyn didn’t drop the knife. She didn’t scream. The Flumazenil had stripped away every trace of terror, leaving behind an arctic, merciless calm.
“My father crushed you because you were weak,” Evelyn said, her voice steady, cutting through the silence of the room. “And he did it without ever looking over his shoulder. You had to wait two decades and send your son to seduce me like a cheap gigolo just to get your hands on our money.”
Fiona’s face turned scarlet. “You insolent little—”
“Shut up, Fiona,” Aidan commanded. He didn’t lower the gun. He stepped forward, the muzzle aimed directly at Evelyn’s chest. “Your father didn't crush me with intelligence. He crushed me with arson and murder. He burned thirty men alive on the Northern Star to protect an insider trading scheme that would have put him in federal prison for the rest of his natural life.”
“You’re lying,” Evelyn said.
“Am I?” Aidan laughed—a dry, rattling sound. “Ask Nora. Why do you think Nora Walsh stayed in your house for twenty years? Because she loved you? Her husband was the chief engineer on the Northern Star. Your father bought her silence with an offshore trust and a comfortable salary to keep her from taking her blueprints to the Department of Justice.”
The air left Evelyn’s lungs. Nora.
The strange look in Nora’s eyes. The bitter comment about twenty-two years.
Everyone in my life, Evelyn realized with sickening clarity, is standing on a mountain of ash.
“It doesn’t matter now,” Aidan said, cocking the pistol. “Flynn was supposed to make it look clean. But you’ve made a mess of things, Evelyn. A woman running through the corridors in a hysterical, drug-induced breakdown... well, if you happen to slash my arm with that kitchen knife before I’m forced to shoot you in self-defense, the maritime inquiry will still rule in our favor.”
Aidan raised the gun.
The heavy teak door behind him exploded inward.
Nora Walsh charged through like a battering ram, carrying a forty-pound commercial brass fire extinguisher. She swung it with the full momentum of her body, striking Aidan directly across the temple.
The gun fired—a muted pfft—and the round pulverized the glass desk behind Evelyn into a shower of diamond shards.
Aidan collapsed onto the parquet floor, the tumbler of Scotch shattering beneath his weight.
Fiona screamed, lunging toward the fallen pistol, her manicured nails clawing at the carpet.
Evelyn didn’t hesitate. She closed the distance, planted her bare foot onto Fiona’s wrist with crushing force, and kicked the firearm across the room, sending it sliding beneath the heavy leather sofa.
“Get the beacon!” Nora shouted, blood dripping from her own forearm where a jagged piece of the splintered door had gouged her flesh. “Flynn is on his way down! He heard the commotion!”
Evelyn grabbed the brass transponder key from the desk.
To the left of the safe, a red steel panel marked DISTRESS TRANSMITTER sat flush against the bulkhead. Evelyn slammed the brass key into the cylinder and twisted it clockwise.
A digital siren began to chime—a high-pitched, automated warble that echoed throughout the entire yacht.
“TRANSPONDER ACTIVE. DISTRESS SIGNAL BROADCASTING ON 406 MHZ. GPS COORDINATES TRANSMITTED TO USCG SECTOR KEY WEST.”
“Done!” Evelyn shouted.
Then, from the shattered doorway, Flynn appeared.
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He held a twelve-gauge flare gun—an industrial maritime tool capable of burning at three thousand degrees. His eyes were wide, bloodshot, stripped of every ounce of charm or civility.
“You stupid, arrogant bitch,” Flynn snarled, raising the flare gun and aiming it squarely at Nora’s chest. “You just killed everyone on this boat.”
