Chapter 5 - THE SIEGE OF BLACKWOOD MANOR
The atmosphere inside Blackwood Manor transformed overnight from cold isolation to an active war zone.
Heavy iron gates at the perimeter were locked down. Armed guards posted every twenty yards along the estate walls. The leaked documents were a death sentence—they contained detailed logs of the Blackwood family’s offshore accounts, weapons manifests, and names of compromised officials.
If the federal prosecutors got those documents admitted into court, Adrian, his captains, and the entire leadership structure would face life sentences.
In the master study, chaos reigned. Senior lieutenants were shouting, throwing accusations, and pointing guns at one another.
"It was the girl!" one of the senior captains yelled, pointing at Evelyn who sat quietly in the corner of the room. "She’s only been here a month! The moment she steps foot in this house, federal warrants start popping up!"
"Shut your mouth, Marcus," Adrian snapped, his voice dangerously low. He stood over his desk, staring at the empty wall safe behind a painting that had been slashed open. "Evelyn doesn't have the combination to this safe."
"Then who does?" Marcus demanded. "Only you, your late father, and..."
"And my brother," Adrian finished softly.
The room fell dead silent.
"Julian is dead," Noah whispered from the door. "He died three years ago in the harbor crash."
"Did he?" Evelyn’s calm voice cut through the heavy tension.
Everyone turned to look at her. She stood up from her chair, holding a stack of yellowed financial ledgers she had brought down from her cold room in the north wing.
"What are you playing at, woman?" Marcus spat.
"Three years ago, Julian Blackwood was reported dead after his car went off the bridge into the ice-cold harbor," Evelyn explained, laying the ledgers on the central table. "His body was never recovered. But if you look at the master ledger from the north wing—which I found buried under forty years of servant logs—there are three monthly payments made to a private medical facility in Switzerland under the name of 'J. Blackwood' signed by your late father."
Adrian felt a chill run down his spine that had nothing to do with the winter draft. "What are you saying, Evelyn?"
"I'm saying your brother didn't die," Evelyn said, her eyes burning with intense intelligence. "He was hidden away. And he isn't trying to destroy the family, Adrian. He’s coming to take back what he thinks is his. He leaked those documents to break your power base, force the family into a panic, and step back into the light as the savior."
Before anyone could process her words, the glass windows of the study shattered inward in a rain of lethal fragments.
Automatic gunfire cut through the night, ripping through the heavy oak furniture. Smoke bombs crashed through the broken frame, filling the room with thick, suffocating white gas.
"Ambush!" Noah yelled, drawing his sidearm as bullets tore into the walls.
Men screamed, furniture was flipped for cover, and blood sprayed across the expensive Persian rugs.
In the blinding smoke and deafening chaos, Adrian tackled Evelyn to the floor, covering her body with his own as high-caliber rounds tore through the ceiling above them.
"Can you move?!" Adrian shouted over the roar of gunfire.
"I can move!" Evelyn choked out through the smoke.
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"The north wing!" Adrian gritted out, dragging her up by the arm. "The walls are reinforced stone and two feet thick! It’s the only part of the house without exterior floor-to-ceiling glass!"
As guards fell around them, Adrian and Evelyn fought their way through the burning corridors of Blackwood Manor, retreating step by step, firing into the smoke, heading toward the one place Adrian had banished her to—the coldest, safest fortress in the entire estate.
