Chapter 908
Standing just behind him was Beatrice, Alistair’s step-grandmother. She wore a red dress that was entirely too bright for a woman of her age, her hand resting possessively on the handle of Grandpa’s wheelchair. She glanced at her diamond-encrusted watch.
Once.
Twice.
“She’s waiting for something,” Alistair murmured. The ice in his glass clinked as his hand trembled — not from fear, but from the effort of holding back violence.
Then the heavy oak doors at the far end of the hall groaned open.
The chatter in the room didn’t taper off. It was severed. A silence so absolute fell over the crowd that Skye could hear the rain beginning to tap against the high windows.
Ethan Vance stood in the doorway.
He shouldn’t have been there. The last intelligence report Julian had given them placed Ethan in a military black site, serving time for his role in the Architect’s scheme — halfway across the world, broken and neutralized. The security perimeter was impenetrable, unless someone on the inside had cleared the path.
But here he was. He wore a damp trench coat over a cheap suit, soaked to the bone, water dripping from his hair onto the pristine parquet floor.
“Ethan?” Julian Vance’s voice cracked from somewhere in the crowd. He pushed through a cluster of bankers, his face draining of color. “Ethan! How did you get in here?”
ѕ𝗍o𝘳𝗶е𝘴 yo𝘂 𝘸on’𝗍 𝗉𝗎𝘁 𝗱𝗼𝘄𝘯 оn 𝘨а𝘭𝗇𝗈𝘷𝘦𝗹𝘀.с𝘰𝘮
Ethan didn’t look at his brother. He didn’t look at Skye. He didn’t look at anyone. His eyes were wide, unblinking, and terrifyingly empty — a void where a person used to be.
“Ethan!” Julian lunged for him.
Ethan moved with a mechanical, jerky fluidity. He sidestepped Julian without turning his head and marched straight toward Grandpa Thorne.
Grandpa Thorne squinted, a confused smile touching his lips. He raised a trembling hand. “Is that… is that the Vance boy? Come to wish an old man well?”
Beatrice took a step back. She didn’t look surprised. She looked satisfied.
“For the new order,” Ethan said. His voice was flat — a recording played through a broken speaker.
He reached into his coat.
“Gun!” Alistair screamed.
The sound tore out of his throat, raw and animal. He vaulted over the railing. It was a twenty-foot drop. He didn’t hesitate.
Ethan drew a vintage revolver. The metal gleamed cold beneath the chandelier’s merciless light.
“No!” Skye shouted, kicking off her heels and sprinting for the stairs, but she was too far away. They were all too far away.
Ethan raised the gun. He didn’t aim. He simply pointed.
Bang.
The sound was nothing like the movies. It was a hard, ugly crack that slapped the air and left a ringing silence in its wake.
Grandpa Thorne jerked back into his wheelchair. A small, dark bloom of red appeared on the white front of his dress shirt. His hand — still raised in greeting — dropped limply to his lap.
Screams erupted. The crowd fractured, people scrambling over each other in a panic of silk and spilled champagne.
Alistair hit the floor in a roll, momentum carrying him straight into Ethan. He didn’t tackle him — he collided with him like a freight train.