Chapter 11 - Victor’s Last Lie
“I did,” Victor said.
Adrian heard Sophia gasp.
Luca raised his weapon.
Adrian did not move.
“Explain.”
Victor looked twenty years older.
“Your father asked me to.”
Dominic laughed.
“Beautiful, isn't it?”
“Shut up,” Adrian said.
Dominic smiled.
Victor continued.
“Richard's cancer had spread. Dominic had arranged to take him alive.”
“Why?”
“To force access to the archive.”
Victor swallowed.
“Your father knew torture would break him eventually.”
Adrian's face tightened.
“He asked you to kill him.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Medication.”
The official heart attack.
Victor had been there.
He had watched Richard die.
“He made me promise never to tell you.”
Adrian turned away.
His father had chosen death.
Victor had carried it out.
And Dominic had spent eleven years using that secret to control Victor.
“If Adrian learns you killed his father,” Dominic said, “he'll destroy you.”
Victor looked at him.
“Maybe he should.”
Adrian turned back.
“No.”
Victor blinked.
“You don't get forgiveness tonight.”
Adrian's voice was quiet.
“But neither does he get to decide what your guilt means.”
Dominic's smile disappeared.
Police sirens sounded outside.
Not local police.
Federal agents.
Luca had transmitted the archive the moment it opened.
Dominic's network was collapsing.
Dominic suddenly broke free of Daniel.
He grabbed Emma.
Clara screamed.
Dominic dragged the child toward the tunnel.
“Back!”
Every gun lowered.
Emma trembled.
Adrian's voice softened.
“Emma.”
She looked at him.
“Remember what you did at the party?”
She sniffed.
“You showed me something nobody else saw.”
Dominic tightened his grip.
“Stop talking.”
Adrian ignored him.
“You were brave because you paid attention.”
Emma looked down.
Dominic had one hand around her.
The other held the gun.
His shoelace was loose.
Emma stomped on it.
Dominic stumbled.
Clara lunged.
Adrian crossed the distance.
The gun fired into the ceiling.
Victor tackled Dominic.
Daniel secured him.
Clara pulled Emma away.
Dominic screamed as agents entered.
“You think this ends with me?”
Adrian looked down at him.
“No.”
He glanced toward the archive.
“It ends with everyone.”
Dominic was taken upstairs.
Victor remained behind.
“What happens now?” he asked.
“You tell the authorities everything.”
Victor nodded.
“Even about your father?”
“Especially that.”
Victor accepted it.
Adrian walked toward Sophia.
She had removed her engagement ring.
It was in her palm.
Adrian looked at it.
“Are you leaving?”
“I don't know.”
That answer frightened him more than yes.
“I lied to you,” she said.
“You were threatened.”
“I still lied.”
“So did I.”
Sophia looked at him.
“I spent three years pretending your world didn't scare me because I thought loving you meant accepting everything.”
“And now?”
“Now I think loving you means refusing to.”
Adrian nodded slowly.
She placed the ring in his hand.
His fingers closed around it.
Not because the relationship was over.
Because if it survived, it had to begin again.
Above them, agents searched the ballroom.
Clara carried Emma upstairs.
Luca stopped beside Adrian.
“We found another file.”
“What file?”
“Your father's archive wasn't only about Dominic.”
Adrian looked at him.
“What else?”
Luca handed him a tablet.
A folder had appeared after Dominic's arrest.
Its title was simple.
SUCCESSION.
Adrian opened it.
There was one document.
One name.
Emma Hale.
And beneath her name was a legal document signed by Richard Marlowe four years before his death.
Adrian read the first paragraph.
Then the second.
His face changed.
Clara saw him from across the room.
“What is it?”
Adrian looked at her.
“Clara... Thomas wasn't only your husband.”
May you like
He turned the tablet toward her.
“He was my father's son.”
