Thee wedding cake hit my face so hard that the entire reception went silent

The sound of sirens filled the valley outside, wailing like a chorus of judgment echoing off the mountain ridges.

Within minutes, flashing red and blue lights illuminated the high arched windows of High Ridge Manor. The FBI tactical response unit, alerted by Eleanor's encrypted federal dispatch, stormed through the shattered gates.

The private security operatives dropped their weapons immediately, kneeling on the wet gravel with their hands behind their heads.

Julian slumped against the iron hearth, exhausted, blood running down the side of his neck, but his eyes never left me. I rushed to him, throwing my arms around his shoulders, burying my face in the curve of his neck.

"You're alive," I sobbed, the adrenaline finally giving way to overwhelming relief. "You're alive..."

"I promised you I wouldn't leave, Clara," Julian murmured, his arms wrapping tightly around my waist, pulling me against his chest with a fierce, trembling warmth. "I promised."

Paramedics swarmed the cellar moments later. They carefully carried Eleanor's body up the stairs in a black shroud. When the lead federal agent—a sharp-eyed woman with a steel-gray badge—approached us, Julian handed over the master hard drive containing Arthur Vance's complete financial empire.

"Arthur Vance and his associates won't see the light of day for three lifetimes," the agent stated, watching as two officers hauled the groaning, handcuffed Arthur up the stone staircase. "Helena Sterling is already in custody at the Metropolitan Club. But we have a problem."

"Garrick," I said, pulling back from Julian, my eyes narrowing.

"He slipped through our perimeter before we sealed the eastern ridge road," the agent nodded grimly. "He took an off-road vehicle toward the Blackwood Cathedral ruins. We have units pursuing him, but the storm is getting worse."

Julian looked at me, his jaw tightening. "He's heading for the vault beneath the cathedral."

"What vault?" I asked.

"The Sterling family emergency vault," Julian explained, wincing as a paramedic applied an antiseptic pad to his temple. "It holds over twenty million dollars in bearer bonds, false passports, and private gold reserves. If Garrick reaches it and gets across the county line to the private runway at Blackwood, he will vanish forever."

"He's not vanishing," I said, my voice hardening like tempered steel. "Not after what he did."

Julian stood up, waving away the paramedic who tried to keep him seated. "Clara, you've done enough. Let the marshals handle him."

"No," I said, looking down at my hands—hands that had kneaded dough, survived burns, and unlocked the secrets of an empire. "He started this on a stage in front of hundreds of people. He thought he could turn my life into a joke. I'm going to finish it."

Julian looked at me for three long seconds. In his dark eyes, I saw worry, respect, and finally, fierce pride.

"Then we take my truck," Julian said, grabbing his keys from the console. "The back roads to Blackwood are washed out. The police cruisers won't make it up the mountain incline. But my Land Rover will."

Ten minutes later, we were tearing through the winding mountain switchbacks through blinding sheets of rain.

The wind howled through the towering pines of the Blackwood Ridge. Up ahead, perched on the cliff edge overlooking the entire valley, the skeletal stone silhouette of the abandoned 19th-century cathedral loomed against the lightning-torn sky.