Chapter 6 - WAREHOUSE SEVENTEEN
Marcus invited me to Warehouse Seventeen himself.
No pretense.
No lawyer language.
A simple message.
We need to finish what we started. Come alone if you want Mara Collins left alone.
I showed Mara.
She went pale.
Then furious.
“He's using my name because he thinks you'll react.”
“Yes.”
“Will you?”
“Not how he expects.”
Police tactical units remained outside the industrial block.
Federal financial investigators monitored the building.
Gabriel went in first through another entrance.
I entered through the front.
Marcus stood beside a folding table.
Old corporate seal.
Transfer documents.
One pistol.
Disappointingly theatrical.
“Dominic.”
“Marcus.”
“You brought people.”
“Yes.”
He almost smiled.
“At least you're honest.”
“You threatened a child’s mother.”
“I threatened paperwork.”
“No.”
I stepped closer.
“You sent men to her home.”
“They were supposed to take a laptop.”
“That distinction exists only in your head.”
Marcus's expression hardened.
Then he looked at the documents.
“Sign.”
“No.”
“You don't understand how much I've protected you.”
“I understand the invoices.”
“That money built alliances.”
“It bought you houses.”
“Both can be true.”
Fair.
“Why Selene?”
“She wanted more than you gave her.”
“That was enough?”
“She was easy to recruit.”
Cruel.
Probably accurate.
“What did you promise?”
“Freedom.”
“From me?”
Marcus smiled.
“Everyone around you thinks they need permission to leave.”
That landed.
Because part of it had been true.
Not legally.
Culturally.
My house.
My company.
My world.
People waited for my approval even when I never explicitly demanded it.
Marcus had used that.
“You built the cage,” he said.
“I just learned where the doors were.”
I hated him because the sentence contained truth.
Then:
“Sign.”
“No.”
Marcus lifted the pistol.
I remained still.
“You won't shoot me.”
“Why?”
“Because then the shares remain locked.”
His jaw tightened.
Correct.
He needed my signature more than my death.
I stepped closer.
“Marcus, it's over.”
He swung the gun toward me.
Not firing.
Using it as a weapon.
First attack.
I caught his wrist.
Drove it aside.
The pistol hit concrete.
Marcus slammed into me.
We crashed into the table.
Documents scattered.
He was older.
Still strong.
Desperate strength is ugly.
He drove a shoulder into my chest.
I hit the warehouse wall.
Gabriel started moving from the shadows.
I raised one hand.
Not yet.
Marcus came again.
Second charge.
This time I stepped aside.
Used his momentum.
Put him hard against the table.
Non-graphic.
Controlled.
Enough.
Gabriel closed in.
Marcus reached toward the fallen gun.
I kicked it away.
Then pinned his arm.
“You get one lesson.”
Marcus laughed breathlessly.
“From you?”
“Yes.”
I looked at him.
“Violence isn't the ending anymore.”
Agents entered.
Cuffs.
Shouts.
Marcus looked up.
“You're giving me to them?”
“Yes.”
“You.”
He laughed again.
“The great Dominic Varela.”
“Disappointing?”
“Your father would be ashamed.”
That old sentence.
Men loved using dead fathers as weapons.
I looked at the forged documents scattered across concrete.
“No.”
Then:
“He'd be terrified I'm finally learning.”
Marcus was taken alive.
Every filing.
Every transfer draft.
Every communication.
Preserved.
The kind of evidence dead men cannot provide.
Outside, Mara waited in a car with her attorney.
I stared.
“You came?”
“You said I could choose.”
I almost laughed.
She stepped out.
Saw the cut near my eyebrow.
“You look terrible.”
“Thank you.”
“Marcus?”
“Alive.”
That mattered to her.
She nodded.
Then:
“Good.”
I looked at her.
“That's all?”
“What do you want, applause?”
I laughed.
Unexpectedly.
Hard.
For the first time in months.
Mara smiled.
And something between us changed.
May you like
Not solved.
Changed.
