Chapter 3 - The Broken Jaw of Arthur Vance
The sound of shattering bone echoed through the corridor like a heavy timber snapping under an iron press.
Arthur Vance’s head whipped sideways, a spray of dark crimson and broken teeth exploding across the wallpaper before his legs folded beneath him. He struck the hardwood floor with a heavy, wet thud, curling into the fetal position, his hands clutching his ruined jaw, groaning through a mouth full of blood.
Camilla let out an ear-splitting shriek, stumbling backward until her spine hit the mahogany banister.
“Gabriel! My God! You’ve lost your mind! He controls the concrete unions! You just attacked an executive partner in front of our investors!”
Gabriel didn't look down at the bleeding billionaire.
He pulled a white linen handkerchief from his pocket, methodically wiping the red specks from his tattooed knuckles before dropping the cloth directly onto Arthur Vance’s face.
“An executive partner, Camilla?” Gabriel murmured, his voice so quiet, so flat and devoid of human warmth that the corridor seemed to drop ten degrees. “Arthur Vance is a predator who belongs in a cage.”
He turned his dark, obsidian eyes onto his fiancée.
Marcus stepped forward, his tactical harness creaking as he held up a heavy, fireproof aluminum document case retrieved from the guest suite’s wardrobe safe.
“We cracked the secondary electronic safe in Suite Nine, boss,” Marcus reported, popping the dual latches. “Found Miss Laurent’s personal offshore satellite ledger. Along with the unredacted transfer agreements for the harbor concrete contracts.”
Gabriel took the ledger from Marcus’s hands.
He flipped the heavy pages under the corridor sconces.
The handwriting was neat, elegant, and unmistakable: Camilla Laurent’s private accounting.
“Read page twenty-two, Camilla,” Gabriel commanded, not raising his voice by a single decibel.
Camilla stood pinned against the banister, shivering violently, her jaw trembling so hard she could barely separate her teeth.
“I... I don't know what that is—”
“I’ll read it to the assembly,” Gabriel said softly.
“‘*Memorandum of Settlement: In exchange for Arthur Vance releasing sixty million dollars in Atlantic City gambling markers held against the Laurent family, Camilla Laurent guarantees the private domestic accommodation of temporary service staff at the Catskills retreat. Initial consideration: Rosa Morales. Secondary consideration: Maya Lin or Chloe Lin.*’”
Gabriel looked up from the page.
The silence that followed was heavy enough to crush bone.
“You didn't just fire Rosa two weeks ago, Camilla,” Gabriel whispered, stepping toward her until his shadow swallowed her whole. “You sold her to Arthur to cover your father's gambling debts in New Jersey. And when Maya refused to let him grope her in my dining room tonight, you sent her nineteen-year-old sister up to this bedroom to fulfill the ledger.”
Camilla began to weep, dropping all pretense of high-society poise, her manicured hands clawing at Gabriel’s lapel in frantic, groveling desperation.
“Gabriel, please! My father owes sixty million dollars to the syndicates in Atlantic City! They were going to burn our penthouses to the ground! Arthur promised to clear the markers if I accommodated him! I had no choice!”
Gabriel looked down at her hands on his coat as if they were venomous spiders.
He didn't strike her.
He simply reached up, closed his fingers around the eight-carat sapphire engagement ring on her finger, and pulled.
The platinum band scraped dryly over her knuckle, coming free in his palm.
Gabriel turned his hand over, letting the ring drop onto the floorboards, where it rolled through the puddle of Arthur Vance’s blood.
“Marcus.”
“Yes, boss.”
“Take Camilla Laurent, Arthur Vance, and Julian Vance down to the lower holding vaults beneath Pier 8. Strip their phones, their jewelry, and their shoes. Lock them in the dry storage cells beneath the waterline.”
He looked back toward the suite where I was holding my weeping sister on the carpet.
May you like
“And tell Mrs. Gable to prepare the master suite in the east wing. Bring Dr. Vance up with a pediatric trauma kit immediately.”
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