Half a dozen federal agents, led by a corrupt senior captain on Blackwood’s payroll named Harrison, rushed into the bunker with weapons drawn.
“Don't move! Hands where we can see them!” Captain Harrison barked, his eyes darting frantically around the high-tech control room until they landed on Elias standing calmly by the central console.
Elias raised his hands slowly, a serene, mocking smile on his face.
“Captain Harrison,” Elias greeted smoothly. “You’re twenty minutes late. Traffic on the West Side Highway must be terrible at four in the morning.”
Harrison’s face flushed red with anger. He marched forward, leveling his service pistol right at Elias’s chest. “Shut your mouth, Vance! You’re under arrest for harboring kidnapped minors and operating an illegal enterprise. Cuff him!”
Before the two junior agents could step forward, the massive wall-mounted monitors behind Elias flickered simultaneously.
The screens stopped displaying satellite feeds and instead began broadcasting live, high-definition financial disclosures, recorded phone conversations, and signed wire-transfer receipts directly to the public federal database, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and every major news network in the country.
BREAKING NEWS: flashed across the bottom of the screens in bold red letters. FEDERAL INVESTIGATION UNCOVERS MASSIVE MONEY LAUNDERING AND SYNDICATE CORRUPTION TIED TO BLACKWOOD HOLDINGS.
Harrison stopped dead in his tracks. His phone—and the phones of every federal agent in the room—began buzzing incessantly with urgent notifications, emergency calls from internal affairs, and arrest warrants issued directly by the U.S. Attorney General.
“What... what is this?!” Harrison stammered, staring at the monitor in absolute horror as his own offshore bank accounts—funded by Blackwood bribes—flashed in glowing red text across the central display.
Elias lowered his hands, walking slowly toward the paralyzed captain.
“That is the end of your career, Captain,” Elias said coldly. “And the end of Blackwood’s empire. My forensic accounting team uploaded the complete ledger of your illicit operations to the Department of Justice three minutes ago. Every bribe you took, every raid you falsified, and every life you ruined is now a matter of public record.”
Harrison dropped his pistol, his knees buckling as he realized he had walked straight into a trap designed to obliterate his entire syndicate in one fell swoop.
At that exact moment, the private elevator chimed behind the agents.
The doors parted to reveal two of Elias’s enforcers dragging a kicking, screaming man in a rumpled designer suit.
It was Victor.
His face was pale, his hair disheveled, and his expensive suit torn as he realized his masters had fallen and he was left completely exposed.
The enforcers shoved Victor forward, sending him sprawling onto the polished concrete floor right at my feet.
I looked down at the man who had lied to me, abused me, and thrown me out into the freezing snow to die with my newborn babies.
Victor looked up, his eyes wide with desperate terror as he recognized the magnitude of what had happened.
“Ava... Ava, please!” Victor sobbed, crawling forward on his hands and knees to grab the hem of my coat. “It was a mistake! Blackwood forced me! I had to follow orders or they would have killed me! We’re a family, Ava—please!”
I stepped back, pulling my coat free from his trembling fingers with absolute, unshakeable coldness.
“You never saw us as a family, Victor,” I said, my voice steady and clear. “You saw us as collateral. And now, you’re bankrupt.”
Elias motioned to his guards. “Take him to the holding cells with Marcus. Let them spend the rest of their natural lives contemplating what happens when you cross El Caminante.”