Chapter 5 - The Threat from the Shadows
At four o'clock in the morning, the modest living room of my brownstone was transformed into an armed command center.
Mrs. Higgins was safely escorted to a private hotel suite under the protection of two armed guards, while Dr. Sarah Chen arrived to re-suture Dominic’s torn incisions.
Dominic sat on my worn floral sofa without a shirt, gritting his teeth in silence as Dr. Chen closed the lacerations with surgical staples.
Lily was sitting on the dining chair wrapped in her rainbow blanket, sipping warm cocoa, her eyes glued to the towering man who had claimed to be her father.
She held her golden dragon toy out toward him with a shy, sweet smile.
“Barnaby says you need a bandage on your cheek, Daddy,” Lily said softly.
Dominic’s hardened expression melted instantly, a radiant, tender smile breaking across his pale face as he took the plush toy and kissed its velvet ear.
“Barnaby is very wise, sweetheart,” Dominic replied, his voice softer than silk.
“And Barnaby is going to help me guard our new castle tonight.”
Marcus Vance entered from the hallway, holding an encrypted satellite communicator that was buzzing aggressively.
“Boss, we intercepted an incoming dispatch from Julian Sterling’s private residence in Back Bay,” Marcus reported gravely.
He tapped the speaker icon, and the arrogant, slurred voice of Dominic’s first cousin, Julian, echoed through the quiet room.
”Dominic, you stubborn bastard… I know you survived the trauma bay,” Julian’s recorded voice sneered through the speaker.
”Did you really think you could hide your little doctor and her bastard brat in East Boston forever?”
”The Sterling Family Trust bylaws are explicit: if you fail to produce a legitimate heir registered with the probate court before your thirty-ninth birthday, the entire forty-billion-dollar maritime conglomerate defaults to my branch.”
”Your birthday is in seventy-two hours, cousin.”
”And by Monday morning, I will own every dock, every ship, and every dollar your father ever built while you and your little family rot in an unmarked grave.”
I felt a wave of suffocating, icy dread wash over my chest as the true motive behind the assassination attempt was unmasked.
Julian didn't just want to eliminate Dominic; he needed to ensure no biological heir could ever step forward to claim the family empire.
Dominic stood up from the sofa, his stitches pulling tight across his ribs as he grabbed the satellite communicator from Marcus’s hand.
“Listen to me very carefully, Julian,” Dominic spoke in a voice so cold it sounded like it came from the depths of a frozen tomb.
“You have seventy-two hours to pack your bags and flee this continent.”
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“Because on Monday morning, I am walking into the corporate boardroom with my daughter holding my hand.”
“And I am going to feed your entire legacy to the wolves.”
