Chapter 4 - The Unraveling Thread
Before anyone could draw breath, Hollis made a sudden, frantic dash toward the double mahogany doors.
"Don't do it, Hollis," Elias's command cracked like a gunshot through the room.
From the shadowed alcoves of the corridor, two of Elias’s most trusted enforcers stepped forward, their submachine guns raised directly at Hollis’s chest. The older man skidded to a halt, raising his trembling hands into the air.
"Elias... please. Listen to me, son," Hollis pleaded, his smooth facade completely crumbling into desperation. "You don't know the whole story. Your father left debts... debts you were never supposed to know about. The Prescott family agreed to absorb those debts only if we allowed their family syndicates to route certain unchecked crates through Pier 14."
"And Cecilia?" Elias demanded, stepping closer, his fists clenched so tight his knuckles turned bone-white. "My twenty-two-year-old sister who loved painting and sailing. What did she have to do with your criminal debts?"
"She found the manifest," Sloan blurted out, her composure dissolving into frantic self-defense. "She found the same damn paperwork this little secretary found! She was going to go to the FBI, Elias! She was going to destroy both of our families! We tried to pay her off, we tried to send her to Europe, but she refused to listen! She was self-righteous and reckless, just like you!"
Willa covered her mouth in horror. The truth hung thick and poisonous in the room. Cecilia hadn't drowned in an unfortunate boating accident. She had been executed to preserve an unholy alliance between the Prescott syndicate and corrupt elements within the Baron organization.
"Who was driving the boat that day, Hollis?" Elias whispered, his voice trembling with an agonizing grief that threatened to tear him apart.
Hollis bowed his head, tears of genuine shame spilling over his weathered cheeks. "It was supposed to be a scare tactic, Elias. I swear on my mother's grave! We just wanted to capsize her dinghy, pick her up, and make her realize how dangerous the water could be. But the current took her. She hit her head on the hull. By the time my divers brought her up, there was no air left in her lungs."
"And you hid her murder for seven years," Elias whispered, every word dripping with cold venom. "You let me stand at her empty casket. You stood beside me at her wake and put your hand on my shoulder while I wept like a child."
"We did it for the family, Elias!" Sloan screamed, her eyes wild with terror as she realized she was losing everything. "If the truth came out, the federal authorities would have seized every crane, every ship, every offshore account! Our marriage was going to solidify the empire! We were going to be untouchable!"
"You will never touch another dime of this empire," Elias said, his voice flat and terrifying. "And you will never see the outside of a maximum-security federal prison."
Suddenly, the screech of tires echoed from the driveway outside. Bright halogen searchlights swept across the library windows, casting long, frantic shadows across the ceiling.
"What is that?" Sloan gasped, turning toward the glass.
"That," Elias said, pulling a secondary phone from his pocket, "is Special Agent Vance of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Willa, do you still have the backup server login key I gave you six months ago?"
May you like
Willa blinked in astonishment, then nodded rapidly. "In my pendant. The micro-SD card."
"Good," Elias smiled, a cold, razor-sharp smirk. "Because while Sloan thought she was playing mafia queen, my private secretary was building the iron-clad case that will bury the Prescott family forever."
