Chapter 7 - Kneeling Before the King
The wind whipped across the tarmac, carrying the bitter chill of the winter night, but the air around Luka Moretti was charged with a lethal, burning heat.
Julian didn't dare look up. He stared at the polished leather toes of Luka’s boots, his entire body shaking so violently that his teeth chattered.
“Please,” Julian whimpered, his voice pathetic and cracked. “Please don't kill me. Take the money. Take the company. Take everything I have left.”
Luka crouched down slowly, bringing his face level with Julian’s terrified, tear-streaked expression.
“I don't want your money, Julian,” Luka said softly, his voice cutting through the roar of the idling jet engines. “Money is just paper. What I wanted was for you to realize how small, how pathetic, and how utterly powerless you truly are.”
Luka reached out, his heavy hand gripping Julian firmly by the collar of his expensive dress shirt, hauling him up to his knees so they were eye-to-eye.
“You thought you could throw away a woman like Clara,” Luka continued, every word dripping with ice. “You thought you could trade an innocent child like a commodity on a stock exchange. You thought you could rewrite history and bury my sister’s memory beneath your corporate lies.”
Julian choked out a sob, unable to form a coherent sentence. “I’m sorry... God, I’m sorry...”
“Save your apologies for a federal judge,” Luka said, shoving Julian back so hard he hit the asphalt hard.
He stood up, gesturing to two of his tactical guards. “Take him and Sterling into federal custody. Make sure the U.S. Attorney has every encrypted file from the M-17 archive. I want them facing every count of corporate fraud, racketeering, and conspiracy available under the law.”
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“Yes, Boss,” the guard snapped, hauling both men roughly to their feet and dragging them toward the waiting SUVs.
As Julian was hauled away into the darkness, screaming incoherently into the night air, Luka turned back toward the idling Gulfstream. His mission on the tarmac was finished. But his real life—the life waiting for him behind the stone walls of the Hudson River estate—was just beginning.
