Chapter 36 - The Price of Bloodlines
We breached the heavy steel doors leading to the rig’s central processing bay, leaving a trail of spent casings and smoke behind us. The interior was cavernous, filled with massive abandoned turbine pumps, dangling chains, and deep oil-collection pits.
In the center of the bay, suspended by industrial winches over an open drilling shaft dropping straight into the ocean, hung Eleanor.
She was lashed inside an iron cargo cage, suspended fifty feet in the air. Beneath her, the black sea churned through the rig's central moon pool like an open grave.
Standing on the catwalk adjacent to the winch controls was the man in the charcoal suit, flanked by five heavily armed mercenaries.
"Hold your fire!" Liam commanded his team, raising a fist as he positioned himself between me and the mercenaries' rifle barrels.
The silver-haired man smiled, leaning on his serpent-headed cane. "Ah, the prodigal daughter arrives. And she brings Julian's old nemesis, Liam Vance. How delightfully dramatic."
"Let her down!" I yelled across the cavernous room, my voice echoing off the corrugated iron walls. "I have the quantum drive! I have the entire ledger!"
I pulled the faraday pouch from my tactical vest and held up the silver drive. The man’s eyes widened with naked, calculating greed.
"Throw it onto the catwalk, Maya," the man said softly. "And your sister gets lowered safely to the deck."
"Don't do it, Maya!" Eleanor screamed from inside the hanging cage, her voice hoarse, cracking with hysteria. "He's lying! He's going to kill us both! He's Victor Vance! Maya, he's Liam's father!"
The words hit the room like a physical explosion.
I froze. The breath was knocked entirely out of my lungs.
I slowly turned my head toward Liam.
Liam didn't drop his weapon. His posture remained rigid, but his face had turned into an unreadable, stony mask of absolute torment.
"Liam?" I whispered, my voice trembling in utter shock. "What is she saying?"
Victor Vance chuckled—a dark, rolling sound that filled the cavernous chamber.
"She speaks the truth, Maya," Victor said, his eyes glittering with cold pride. "Liam didn't stumble onto your case by accident. He didn't come to your rescue out of the goodness of his heart. Did you really think an elite former intelligence operative just happened to practice family law in your sleepy coastal town?"
"Shut up, Victor!" Liam snarled, his voice vibrating with a lethal, suppressed fury I had never heard from him before.
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"Tell her, son," Victor sneered, tapping his cane against the steel railing. "Tell her why you came to Massachusetts. Tell her who built the Sovereign Trust."
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