Chapter 6 - THE SILENT PUPPETEER
I carried Jamie upstairs to the master bedroom, laying him down on a king-sized bed topped with Egyptian cotton sheets—the very sheets my mother had reserved for her high-society guests while my wife slept on concrete.
Sarah sat beside him, stroking his thin hair. Her hands were still shaking.
"What did you mean, Sarah?" I asked, locking the heavy mahogany door behind me. "Who else was involved?"
Sarah looked up, tears brimming in her eyes. "Your mother... she didn't have the brains to set up those offshore accounts, David. She didn't know how to forge your signature on the legal power of attorney documents. Someone was guiding her. Someone who wanted you out of the country forever."
My eyes narrowed. "Who?"
Before she could answer, the mansion's power suddenly cut out.
absolute darkness swallowed the room.
The hum of the central air conditioning died. The grand chandeliers vanished. Below us, the faint sound of glass breaking resonated from the ground floor.
"David!" Sarah gasped, pulling Jamie tight against her chest.
"Stay here. Lock the door behind me," I commanded in a whisper, reaching into my travel bag and pulling out a heavy steel flashlight and a tactical folding knife I had carried through the desert fields.
"David, don't go!"
"I spent five years in the dark, Sarah," I said, my voice dropping into an icy register. "Nobody touches my family again."
I slipped out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind me. The grand hallway was pitch black, illuminated only by the rhythmic flashes of lightning outside.
I padded down the carpeted stairs, my movements completely silent. The smell of the house had changed. The perfume and champagne scent was gone, replaced by the faint, bitter smell of gasoline and wet leather.
Down in the foyer, a tall silhouette stood near the grand fireplace, casually striking a silver Zippo lighter.
The small yellow flame illuminated a sharp jawline, tailored suit, and silver hair.
It wasn't a stranger.
It was Richard Sterling—the Mayor of Bayside Heights, and the man who had written my original recommendation letter to get my contract in Saudi Arabia five years ago.
"I must admit, David," Richard said smoothly, his voice echoing in the empty hall as he closed the lighter, plunging us back into semi-darkness. "You survived much longer in the Middle East than I anticipated. The heat usually breaks men like you in three years."
May you like
"Richard," I said, stepping into the dim light of the lightning flashes. "You were at the party tonight. You sat at my table."
"I was," Richard smiled, pulling a heavy suppressed pistol from his jacket. "And I watched you ruin five years of careful financial planning in less than twenty minutes."
