Chapter 13 - The Matriarch's Return
The heavy steel doors of the vault trembled under the strike of a breaching charge. Dust fell from the ceiling like white snow.
“We have to move, now!” Adrian shouted, grabbing my hand and leading me toward a hidden escape elevator concealed behind a mahogany bookshelf.
We grabbed Mia from the upper lounge. She was clutching Gerald tightly against her chest, her small eyes wide with confusion. “Mommy, why are the loud lights blinking? Is Mr. Adrian playing superhero?”
“Yes, baby,” I choked out, pressing a kiss to her forehead as we rushed into the private elevator shaft. “We’re playing a game.”
The elevator plummeted straight to the underground parking garage, where a armored, bulletproof sedan was waiting. But as the elevator doors slid open, a figure was already standing in the shadows beside the car.
It wasn't a gunman. It was a tall, regal woman in a white silk trench coat, her graying hair pinned in a flawless bun, wearing diamonds that caught the low halogen light.
Eleanor Kane. Adrian’s mother. The woman who had vanished to Europe a decade ago.
“Mother,” Adrian stopped dead in his tracks, shielding Mia and me behind his back.
“You always were too emotional, Adrian,” Eleanor said, her voice like liquid ice. She held a pearl-handled pistol casually at her side. “I warned your father that leaving his legacy to a love-child would destroy us. Now Damon has returned, and he has brought half of Wall Street with him.”
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“You set this up!” Adrian raged, his chest heaving. “You leaked the designs! You helped Julian escape!”
“I did what was necessary to preserve the bloodline,” Eleanor replied coldly, pointing the gun straight at my head. “Hand the girl over, Adrian. Damon will spare your life if you surrender the controlling shares of Kane Global. Let the child return to her true father.”
