Chapter 5 - THE MAN WHO BUILT AN EMPIRE ON A LIE
Vincent’s gun remained pointed at Marcus’s chest.
Marcus seemed almost amused by it.
“Put it down.”
“No.”
“Then Daniel dies first.”
A red laser dot appeared on Daniel’s forehead.
Another appeared on Claire’s chest.
A third settled against Vincent’s shoulder.
Marcus opened his hands.
“You always were stubborn.”
Vincent’s finger tightened against the trigger.
“So were you.”
“Difference is, I taught you when stubbornness becomes stupidity.”
Daniel slowly lowered his gun.
Vincent did not.
Marcus looked toward Sophie.
The little girl had moved behind Claire.
“Leave her out of this.”
Marcus smiled.
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The weakness.”
Vincent’s eyes became lethal.
“Choose your next sentence carefully.”
Marcus laughed.
“Your father said something similar about your mother.”
Natalie whispered, “Vincent, don’t.”
Too late.
Vincent stepped forward.
Three rifles clicked.
Marcus remained calm.
“Anthony Rowan had the same disease you do.”
“What disease?”
“He believed family mattered more than power.”
“You killed him.”
Marcus did not deny it.
That hurt more than denial would have.
Vincent’s entire childhood rearranged itself inside his head.
Marcus at the funeral.
Marcus holding his mother’s shoulders.
Marcus teaching a nineteen-year-old Vincent which Bellucci warehouse to burn.
Marcus embracing him after the final retaliatory killing.
All of it.
A performance.
“You made me kill them.”
“The Belluccis weren’t innocent.”
“They didn’t kill my father.”
“No.”
Vincent’s voice cracked like a whip.
“You made me kill men for something you did.”
Marcus’s expression hardened slightly.
“I made you strong.”
“You made me useful.”
“Same thing.”
“No.”
Vincent looked toward Sophie.
“No, it isn’t.”
Marcus noticed.
“There’s your problem.”
Sophie squeezed Claire’s hand.
Marcus continued.
“You spent twenty years building an empire people fear. Now one little girl looks at you and suddenly you want to pretend you’re a different man.”
Vincent said nothing.
Marcus took another step.
“I gave you Chicago.”
“You stole my life.”
“I saved your life.”
“You murdered my father.”
“Because your father planned to destroy everything we built.”
“You mean everything you stole.”
Marcus’s eyes narrowed.
Natalie struggled to stand.
“He was laundering millions through Rowan routes before your father discovered it.”
Marcus looked at her with genuine irritation.
“You always did talk too much.”
“You should have killed me.”
“I almost did.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because you hid the records.”
Natalie smiled weakly.
“And you spent eight years looking.”
Marcus’s face changed.
Only slightly.
But Vincent saw it.
Fear.
So the evidence Claire had carried into his house was more dangerous than Marcus wanted anyone to know.
Vincent glanced at the photograph still tucked inside his coat.
Marcus noticed.
“There it is.”
Claire looked at Vincent.
Marcus extended his hand.
“Give me the photograph.”
“You want an old picture?”
“You know better.”
“Apparently I don’t. I spent most of my life thinking you loved me.”
Something flickered behind Marcus’s eyes.
Then disappeared.
“In my way, I did.”
Vincent actually laughed.
It was cold.
“You murdered my father, imprisoned Natalie, tried to erase my daughter, and used me to kill your enemies.”
“I made you king.”
Vincent’s answer came immediately.
“I would rather have been a father.”
For the first time, Marcus lost his smile.
The room became still.
Sophie looked at Vincent.
Claire closed her eyes briefly.
Natalie began to cry.
Marcus extended his hand again.
“The photograph.”
Vincent slowly removed it.
Fourteen years of memory.
Natalie in yellow.
Vincent smiling.
The beginning of everything Marcus had tried to destroy.
“What’s inside it?” Vincent asked.
Marcus said nothing.
Natalie answered.
“A cipher.”
Marcus turned toward her.
She smiled.
“You never figured that out either?”
Vincent looked at the photograph.
Natalie explained.
“The heat-ink numbers are only half the information. The picture itself contains the second half.”
Daniel frowned.
“Where?”
“The rooftop.”
Vincent stared at it.
Windows.
Brickwork.
Water tower.
Graffiti.
Then he understood.
The arrangement of windows across the building behind them.
Numbers.
A key.
Marcus swore.
Vincent looked at him.
“You tortured her for eight years because you couldn’t solve a photograph?”
“I kept her alive because eventually she would talk.”
“She didn’t.”
Marcus’s face darkened.
Natalie straightened despite her weakness.
“No.”
Something like pride moved across Vincent’s expression.
Marcus saw it.
And snapped.
He drew a pistol.
Everything happened at once.
Daniel lunged sideways.
Vincent fired.
The lights went out.
Claire screamed.
Gunfire tore through the basement.
Vincent dropped behind a metal cabinet.
He heard Daniel shouting commands.
A man collapsed somewhere near the door.
Sophie cried out.
Vincent moved toward the sound.
“Sophie!”
“Here!”
Claire had pulled her beneath the bed.
Natalie crawled toward them.
Vincent fired twice toward muzzle flashes.
Then emergency lights flickered on.
Red.
Dim.
Daniel had reached a breaker.
Two of Marcus’s men were down.
Three others retreated toward the hallway.
Marcus had vanished.
Vincent saw Natalie first.
Alive.
Claire.
Alive.
Sophie.
Alive.
Then Claire’s eyes widened.
“Vincent!”
He turned.
Marcus stood behind him.
Gun raised.
Vincent began to pivot.
Marcus fired.
The bullet did not hit Vincent.
Claire stepped between them.
Her body jerked.
Sophie screamed.
“Mom!”
Claire collapsed.
Vincent caught her before she struck the floor.
Blood spread across her blouse.
Something inside Vincent detonated.
He fired at Marcus.
Marcus disappeared behind the doorway.
Daniel chased him.
Natalie pressed both hands against Claire’s wound.
“Stay with me!”
Sophie dropped beside them sobbing.
“Mom! Mom!”
Claire’s eyes fluttered.
Vincent tore off his jacket.
“Pressure.”
Natalie pressed the fabric against Claire’s shoulder.
“She’s bleeding badly.”
Vincent reached for his phone.
No signal underground.
He lifted Claire.
Sophie clung to his leg.
“Is she dying?”
“No.”
Vincent said it so forcefully the entire room seemed to obey.
“She is not dying.”
They raced toward the loading bay.
Daniel returned.
“Marcus got out through the north tunnel.”
“Let him.”
Daniel stared at Vincent.
For twenty years, Marcus escaping would have been unacceptable.
Not tonight.
Vincent looked down at Claire.
“Family first.”
They reached the vehicles.
Claire was barely conscious.
Sophie climbed beside her.
Natalie followed.
As Vincent shut the door, Claire grabbed his wrist.
“Photo.”
“What?”
“Marcus…”
Her voice weakened.
“The photo.”
Vincent touched his coat.
Empty.
His blood turned cold.
He remembered Marcus colliding with him in the darkness.
Marcus had taken it.
Daniel heard.
“If he has the cipher—”
“He can destroy the evidence,” Natalie whispered.
Claire’s eyes closed.
Sophie screamed her name.
Vincent pressed his fingers to Claire’s neck.
A pulse.
Weak.
But there.
The vehicle tore toward the hospital.
Behind them, flames suddenly erupted from Halcyon Medical Storage.
Marcus was burning the facility.
Natalie stared through the rear window.
“That photograph was our only copy of the cipher.”
Vincent looked down at Claire’s blood covering his hands.
“No.”
Natalie turned.
“What?”
May you like
Vincent’s gray eyes hardened.
“Marcus thinks it was.”
