Chapter 6 - The Final AscentI chased Julian up the metal spiral staircase leading to the crane control room high above the flooded warehouse floor.
My steel braces clanged loudly against every step, each upward push feeling like lifting a ton of bricks. My lungs burned for oxygen, and sweat blinded my eyes, but I refused to stop. Eight years of confinement, eight years of wheelchair-bound helplessness—I was burning it all away with every agonizing step.
Julian slammed the heavy steel door of the control room behind him, locking it from the inside.
“You can’t change the past, Caleb!” Julian’s voice echoed through the metal vents. “Audrey chose me in her heart! That’s why her brakes failed! That’s why she was running to my apartment that night!”
The words hit me harder than any bullet could have.
I stopped on the top landing, my chest heaving, my grip tightening on my pistol. “What did you say?”
“She wasn't running from me, Caleb!” Julian shouted through the thick steel door. “She was running to tell you that she was pregnant... and that she was leaving you for me!”
Silence crashed over the room, heavier than the ocean water below.
Pregnancy. Leaving me.
My mind spun. For eight years, I had blamed myself, believing the crash was a freak accident tied to my ruthless business enemies. But if Julian’s words were true... Audrey had been carrying his child. And Julian, consumed by madness when she refused to abandon me fully at the last second, must have sabotaged the vehicle to trap her forever—only for it to backfire completely.
“You monster,” I whispered, a dark, cold rage flooding my veins.
With a roar of pure fury, I raised my right boot and slammed it against the reinforced lock of the control room door.
May you like
CRACK.
The steel frame buckled. I kicked it again—once, twice—until the latch shattered and the door swung wide open.
