Chapter 11 - The Betrayal Beside Elias
Emergency lights flickered on.
Marco stood near the elevator.
Three armed men surrounded him.
Elias did not look shocked.
That was somehow more frightening.
“You sold me out.”
Marco shrugged.
“I survived you.”
“We grew up together.”
“And I spent twenty years standing one step behind you.”
Elias’s expression did not change.
Marco smiled.
“Mercer offered something you never would.”
“What?”
“Everything.”
Daniel slowly moved toward me.
Marco noticed.
“Stay where you are.”
Daniel stopped.
Marco looked at the hard drive.
“Put it down.”
Daniel hesitated.
Marco raised his weapon.
I thought about Lucy.
About my babies.
About seventeen stolen years from my mother.
I was tired of men with weapons deciding who mattered.
“The drive won’t help you.”
Everyone looked at me.
Marco laughed.
“You don’t know what’s on it.”
“I know Mercer needs me alive long enough to control the property.”
Marco’s smile faded.
“That makes me more valuable than the drive.”
Elias glanced at me.
He understood immediately.
Marco did too.
“You think that protects you?”
“No.”
I stepped forward.
“I think greed protects me.”
Marco’s men exchanged uncertain looks.
“Mercer wants the land.”
“He cannot get it if you kill me here.”
Marco pointed the gun toward Daniel instead.
“Then I kill him.”
Daniel laughed weakly.
“Get in line.”
The absurdity almost made me smile.
Then Elias moved.
Everything happened in seconds.
A guard struck the lights.
Darkness.
A struggle.
A crash.
I dropped behind a steel cabinet.
Daniel fell beside me.
When the emergency lights returned, Marco was on the ground.
Elias stood above him.
One of Marco’s men had surrendered.
Another had fled.
The third was injured but alive.
Elias stared at Marco.
“How long?”
Marco spat blood onto the concrete.
“Long enough.”
“Did Mercer order the penthouse attack?”
“Yes.”
“Saint Augustine?”
“Yes.”
“Daniel’s escape?”
Marco laughed.
“You really want to know what Mercer ordered?”
Elias crouched.
Marco looked toward me.
“He ordered the overpass too.”
My body went cold.
“What?”
Daniel’s face changed.
“I didn’t know that.”
Marco smiled cruelly.
“Mercer had men watching Ava.”
“They were supposed to make sure the cold finished the job.”
My breathing stopped.
“Why didn’t they?”
“Because Elias arrived.”
For the first time, Marco looked genuinely irritated.
“One wrong convoy.”
“One wrong turn.”
“One man looking out a window.”
“That’s all it took to ruin twenty years of planning.”
Elias stood.
Daniel stared at me.
His voice shook.
“Ava.”
I did not look at him.
Marco laughed again.
“Mercer is waiting at Pier Nine.”
Elias’s phone vibrated.
A photograph appeared.
Lucy sat tied to a chair.
Behind her stood Vincent Mercer.
A message appeared beneath it.
MIDNIGHT.
May you like
BRING AVA.
OR THE GIRL DIES.
