Chapter 93 - The Matriarch's Poisoned Bargain
The timer on the detonator dropped below ninety seconds: 01:29... 01:28...
The ocean above them roared as the outer bay doors opened fully. Cold Pacific water swirled violently into the chamber, the water level rising at an alarming speed, already swallowing the lower access ladders of the docking bay. The colossal submarine was rising rapidly toward the ceiling escape chute.
"Give me the child, Elena," Eleanor said, stepping forward, the muzzle of her weapon held steady, aimed dead at the center of Elena's chest. "Hand over Maya, and I will enter the abort sequence. You will have two minutes to reach the secondary emergency escape pod on the upper deck."
"You pushed me into the sea on my wedding day," Elena said through clenched teeth, her vision tunneling as blood ran down her sliced arm. "You stood at the rail and watched me freeze! You think I’d ever let your hands touch my daughter?"
"You survived that fall because you are cunning," Eleanor replied smoothly, taking another step. The distance between them was now less than fifteen feet. "I respect survival. But this child does not belong to your world of cheap morals and sentimentality. Look at her! Her vocal acoustics just awakened the greatest clandestine weapon system the Western hemisphere has ever known. She is the legitimate biological heir to thirty-four billion dollars and a private naval fleet. She is a Montgomery."
"She is my daughter!" Elena screamed.
"She is an asset!" Eleanor countered, her eyes flashing with cold, reptilian fury. "And assets require proper management. Arthur is dead. Lucian is bleeding out at your feet. There is no one left to run this empire except me—and Maya, once I mold her into something steel-jawed and merciless. Give her to me. Or stay here and be crushed under four billion gallons of seawater."
Timer: 00:58... 00:57...
On the deck between them, Lucian let out a wet, gurgling groan. His hand, slippery with his own blood, reached up and grabbed Eleanor’s ankle.
"Mother..." he choked out, his eyes begging for mercy. "Take me... don't leave me..."
Eleanor didn't even look down at her firstborn son. Without breaking eye contact with Elena, Eleanor calmly shifted her weight, brought her boot down with brutal precision onto Lucian’s shattered jaw, and pulled the trigger of her sidearm.
*THWIP.*
A single silenced bullet ended Lucian Montgomery's life mid-sentence. His head snapped back, his eyes staring blankly at the iron ceiling as his fingers went limp.
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Elena felt a chill run through her soul that was colder than the ocean depths. A mother who could murder her own son without a second thought was not a human being. She was a demon wrapped in pearl necklaces and silk.
"Now," Eleanor said softly, stepping over her son's corpse, the smoking gun leveling once again at Elena's head. "Thirty seconds, Elena. The abort code is in my hand. What is your choice? Your pride... or your child’s life?"
