Chapter 25
Panic erupted across the grand rotunda. Socialites scrambled behind stone pillars and display cases, while the string quartet abandoned their instruments and fled toward the emergency exits.
Ezra remained perfectly still. His weight was balanced squarely on his back heel, his eyes locked onto Julian’s trembling finger on the trigger. He wasn't afraid for himself; his mind was calculating angles, distances, and exit velocities with cold, clinical precision.
"You're making a terrible mistake, Julian," Ezra said, his voice cutting through the chaos with absolute authority.
"The only mistake I made was letting you walk out of the Port Lands alive two years ago!" Julian hissed, cocking the hammer of his pistol. "Say goodbye, Ezra."
Before Julian could pull the trigger, a crisp, clear sound echoed from the shadows of the upper mezzanine balcony.
"Hey, Julian!"
Julian froze, looking upward.
Nessa Caldwell stood on the elevated stone walkway overlooking the rotunda. She had already shed her formal performance shoes, standing barefoot in a sleek, dark silk jumpsuit designed for absolute mobility. In her hands, she wasn't holding a cello bow—she was holding a heavy decorative iron standard she had unhooked from the velvet rope barrier.
Before Julian’s mercenaries could swivel their weapons upward, Nessa launched herself off the balcony in a breathtaking, athletic leap, grabbing hold of a suspended velvet banner rope and swinging downward with devastating momentum.
She crashed feet-first directly into the chest of the lead mercenary, sending him flying backward into a glass display case with a thunderous smash.
Julian spun around in absolute shock, trying to re-aim his pistol at Nessa. But he was too slow.
As Nessa landed gracefully on the marble floor, she pivoted on her heel, swept the legs out from under the second mercenary, and drove a lightning-fast roundhouse kick straight into Julian Cross’s wrist.
CRACK!
Julian shrieked in agony as the pistol shattered his fingers and clattered uselessly across the marble floor.
Before Julian could even stumble backward, Nessa closed the distance, grabbed the collar of his white tuxedo jacket, and drove a brutal, perfectly executed knee strike straight into his midsection.
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Julian doubled over, gasping for air, his eyes rolling back as he collapsed hard onto the stone floor, completely unconscious.
The remaining mercenaries dropped their weapons, raising their hands in surrender as Pavl Gorski and an elite team of federal security operatives swarmed the rotunda from every angle, slapping tactical cuffs onto the defeated Vanguard agents in seconds.
