Chapter 20 - THE GRASP ON THE EDGE
The force of her momentum nearly dragged me over the edge with her. My boots slipped on the wet shale, my knees smashing violently against the sharp rock face. Eleanor swung into the empty air, her weight pulling against my shoulders with brutal agony.
"Let me go!" she shrieked, kicking wildly above the black water. "Let me go, Alex!"
"No!" I roared, my muscles screaming as I dug my left hand into a crack in the limestone, locking my grip onto her wrist with my right. "You don't get to die a martyr, Eleanor! You don't get to hide behind the water like you hid Sarah! You are going to stand in a courtroom! You are going to hear every single charge read into the public record! You will look me in the eye when the judge strips the Vance name away from you!"
"Alex!"
Arthur burst through the brush, followed closely by two state troopers with weapons drawn and heavy tactical flashlights blazing.
"Drop your weapon! State police!" one officer yelled before seeing the situation. "Hold on, son! We've got you!"
The two troopers threw themselves onto the rocks beside me, grabbing Eleanor by the arms and haul-line harness. With a coordinated grunt, they hauled her violently back over the cliff edge and slammed her face-down onto the mud.
*Click. Click.*
The sound of steel handcuffs locking around Eleanor’s wrists was the sweetest sound I had ever heard.
Eleanor sobbed into the dirt, her face covered in muck and gravel, spitting out curses that made the troopers shake their heads in disgust. As they hauled her to her feet, she turned her venomous gaze toward me one last time, her teeth stained with blood from biting her own lip.
"You're nothing," she whispered, her voice a hollow, defeated rasp. "You'll never be anything but a mistake."
"My name is Alex Linwood Vance," I said, looking straight into her dying empire. "And tomorrow morning, the whole world is going to read your obituary while you're still alive."
Arthur walked up beside me, draping his warm wool overcoat over my shivering shoulders. "Are you alright, Alex?"
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"I’m more than alright, Arthur," I said, watching the troopers drag the screaming matriarch down the dark trail. "Let’s go find what my father left beneath that cabin floor."
***
