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“The doctor said she was beaten by 8 men. But when I checked the security footage from our bedroom, I realized the ultimate monster was the one standing right behind me…” / Chapter 6 / 8

Chapter 6 - THE SIX BROTHERS

The central hall of the Blackwood mansion turned into an absolute slaughterhouse.

Two mercenaries charged down the grand curved staircase, firing automatic weapons. Ethan ducked behind a massive marble pillar, waiting for the pause in their cadence as they emptied their magazines.

Click.

Ethan stepped out, firing controlled three-round bursts. Both men collapsed down the stairs, their weapons clattering across the marble floor.

He moved up the stairs with brutal efficiency.

On the second-floor landing, two of the Blackwood brothers—Julian and Gabriel—stepped out from the library, drawing handguns. They were wealthy playboys who had spent their lives hiding behind their father's power, abusing people who couldn't fight back.

When they saw Ethan, covered in rain and blood, his eyes burning behind thermal goggles, terror paralyzed them.

"Ethan, wait—!" Julian screamed.

Ethan closed the distance in a flash. He disarmed Julian, breaking his wrist with a swift twist, and threw him over the second-floor balcony railing. Julian landed with a sickening crash onto the grand piano in the foyer below.

Gabriel tried to run, but Ethan caught him by the back of his suit jacket, dragging him down the hall and slamming him into the steel door of the central security office.

"Where is the sub-basement key?" Ethan demanded.

Gabriel pointed trembling fingers toward Victor’s private study at the end of the hall. "In... in Dad's desk! The hidden lift is behind the wine cellar!"

Ethan knocked Gabriel cold with a heavy backhand and proceeded toward the study.

Inside the study, Marcus and the three remaining brothers—Luke, Thomas, and Alexander—were waiting behind a overturned mahogany desk, their guns trained on the door.

Ethan didn't walk through the door.

He set a breaching charge on the drywall adjacent to the doorway, blowing a massive hole straight through the wall.

The explosion threw the brothers to the floor, disorienting them in a cloud of dust and debris. Ethan stepped through the wall, firing non-lethal rubber shock rounds directly into their chests and shoulders, neutralizing them instantly.

Marcus scrambled backward toward the corner, bleeding from his forehead, clutching a jammed pistol.

Ethan walked over, kicked the gun out of his hand, and pinned Marcus to the wall with his boot against his throat.

"You called my wife a victim," Ethan growled, leaning down. "You called this a 'family matter.' Now look at your family."

Marcus coughed, looking around at his groaning, incapacitated brothers scattered across the ruined study. "You... you think you're going to win this, Walker? Victor is already downstairs. He has the detonator."

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Ethan stopped. "What detonator?"

Marcus smirked through his bloodied lips. "The safe room... it's wired with military C4. If anyone tries to break the door without the code, or if Victor hits the manual switch... the entire sub-basement goes up. Claire dies in a hole."

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