Chapter 4 - THE TABLES TURNVictor dropped the gun. It hit the marble floor with a dull, heavy clatter, spinning away toward the baseboard.
"You..." Victor choked out, stumbling backward until his back hit the reinforced glass window. "You were supposed to be brain dead. Gallagher’s labs... the paralysis..."
"Gallagher is a degenerate gambler who bought his way out of prison with my money," Nicholas said. His voice was a raspy, gravel-pit growl, unused for two weeks, but it carried a weight that made the air pressure in the room feel like it had dropped by half. "Did you really think I’d trust my life to a man who couldn't keep his hands off roulette tables?"
Nicholas reached up with his right hand—the one that had been dead weight an hour ago—and ripped the medical tape and IV needle out of his arm with a sharp, brutal motion. A single drop of dark blood welled on his skin, which he ignored entirely as he pushed himself up from the mattress.
The movement was rigid, fueled by pure adrenaline and a dangerously low dose of reversal agents Marcus had smuggled in through Sue’s cleaning cart twenty minutes prior, but it was enough.
Nicholas swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood.
He towered over Chloe, who had crumpled against the medical cart, her perfectly manicured fingernails digging into the steel edge until they bled.
"Nicholas," she breathed, her voice cracking into a pathetic, high-pitched whine. Her eyes darted wildly toward Marcus and the armed guards, then back to the man she had planned to bury by morning. "Nicholas, please. You don't understand. They threatened me. Rivas... he said if I didn't help them take over the accounts, he would kill my family. I did it for us. To protect—"
"Shut up, Chloe," Nicholas whispered.
The softness of his tone was terrifying. It was the voice he used right before a warehouse burned down or a traitor was dropped into Lake Michigan with concrete shoes.
"You spent fourteen days complaining that my death was taking too long," Nicholas said, stepping closer. "You checked your reflection in my monitor to make sure your hair looked right while my body fought off your poison. Don't insult my intelligence by playing the victim now. You’ve always been a shark in cashmere. I just forgot to check your teeth."
Chloe shrank back, her expensive coat rustling like dry leaves. "You can't do anything to me. My family name... the board... the federal investigators—"
"The board answers to the majority stakeholder," Nicholas interrupted smoothly. "And as of midnight, thanks to a digital proxy signature you signed on a fake death certificate five minutes ago, you’ve legally transferred all your voting shares to an anonymous holding company." He tilted his head with a cold smile. "Do you know who owns that holding company, Chloe?"
May you like
She stared at him, horror dawning in her wide, manicured eyes.
"Sue Miller," Nicholas said softly. "Or rather, the real identity behind her papers: my chief forensic auditor, who spent the last month digging through your secret offshore accounts while you were busy planning my funeral."
