Chapter 8 - Epilogue – The Last Message
Three miles away, inside the sterile, high-security visiting room of the federal penitentiary, fluorescent lights hummed a harsh, rhythmic tune against grease-stained white walls.
Marcus Hammond sat on a bolted metal stool, staring down at his hands—hands that were now calloused from prison labor, stripped of every ring, every watch, and every ounce of corporate luxury he had once killed to protect.
The heavy steel door at the end of the corridor buzzed open.
A prison guard dropped a thick manila envelope onto the Formica table in front of Marcus.
“Legal mail,” the guard muttered before turning around and walking away, his boots echoing sharply down the concrete hall.
Marcus’s hands trembled as he picked up the envelope. There was no return address. Just a neat, elegant script bearing his full name.
Slowly, deliberately, he tore open the flap and slid out a single, heavy sheet of embossed cardstock.
There was no legal document inside. No court summons. No divorce papers.
Just a single printed photograph.
It was a picture taken from a high vantage point overlooking the Pacific coastline. In the foreground, standing on the sun-drenched balcony of the Sterling Tower, stood Victoria, looking radiantly alive, holding a laughing baby girl wrapped in ivory cashmere. Standing right beside them, smiling with a fierce, untouchable pride, was William Sterling.
Across the bottom of the photograph, written in bold, permanent black ink, was a single handwritten message:
May you like
Count what you know, Marcus. Fear lies. Facts don’t. Game over.
Marcus dropped the photograph onto the table, his chest heaving as the cold reality of his prison cell closed in around him for the rest of eternity.
