Chapter 18 - The Vault Beneath the Orchard
For the first time, Marcus Vance’s aristocratic composure cracked. A twitch agitated the corner of his left eye.
"Cut the feed," Marcus hissed to the armed men behind him.
"You can't cut satellite microwave relay, you arrogant fossil," Claire yelled down, grinning like a predator. "The legal defense committee, the district attorney, and twelve news outlets just received the emergency ping. You're trending, Marcus. The ghost of Crown Gallery has risen from the dead on high-definition video."
"Kill the generator!" Marcus snarled, his voice losing all its cultivated nobility.
"Stand down, Marcus!" Celia walked out onto the porch, holding an old leather-bound ledger in her hand. Her head was held high, her eyes blazing with thirty years of repressed fury. "You can kill us all, but you can't kill what's already archived in the county records. Key number 004 doesn't open the vault in the Crown Gallery."
Marcus froze, his knuckles whitening around his silver cane.
"You thought Helena lost it," Celia continued, stepping beside Emma. "You searched the Manhattan penthouse, you tore apart the Hamptons estate. But Helena knew you would come back to strip her of everything once the heat died down. She hid the master ledger right here, beneath the orchard."
Emma looked down at the brass key in her hand. "The courier in the tunnel wasn't your man, Marcus. He was Helena’s attorney."
"Helena turned state's evidence three hours ago," Nora added, stepping into the porch light with her phone held aloft, broadcasting the official wire release from the state penitentiary. "She traded your location for protective custody. She knew you’d come for Emma."
Marcus looked from Celia to the blinking red light of Claire's camera. The cold, calculating mind of the billionaire realized, in one terrifying instant, that the trap hadn't been set by him.
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It had been set by the two sisters he had tried to crush.
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