Chapter 8
Z
The embers of the burnt-out lodge spiraled into the cold night sky like dying stars. By the time emergency vehicles, fire trucks, and federal reinforcements swarmed the remote mountain property, the structure was reduced to a blackened, smoking skeleton of charred timber and twisted metal.
Robert Vance did not survive the fire. State troopers recovered his remains from the basement ruins four hours later. The man who had ruled my life with an iron fist, who had held my arms down while my face was shattered, was reduced to ash and bone.
Sitting in the back of an FBI mobile command van wrapped in a heavy wool blanket, I watched the local news crew reporting live from the perimeter barricade. The banner at the bottom of the screen read: "CONNECTICUT DEVELOPER DIES IN FIRE FOLLOWING ARMED STANDOFF; DAUGHTER SURVIVES."
The door of the van slid open. Victoria Sterling stepped inside, stepping out of the freezing rain. She carried two paper cups of hot coffee, handing one to me before taking a seat on the bench opposite mine.
"It's officially over, Emily," Victoria said softly, her eyes studying my calm, unreadable face. "The Bratva leadership in Moscow pulled back their operatives the moment Robert died. With the primary biometric key permanently locked out, the twenty million dollars is frozen indefinitely in the Swiss banking system. They have no reason to come after you anymore."
I took a slow sip of the scalding black coffee, feeling the heat spread down my throat. "And Travis?"
"Travis pleaded guilty thirty minutes ago," Victoria replied. "He realized he was facing federal RICO charges without Robert to take the fall. He took a fifteen-year sentence at a maximum-security federal facility in Pennsylvania. His career is over, his reputation is ruined, and his family has publicly disowned him."
I looked out the open van door toward another government vehicle parked fifty yards away. Inside sat Eleanor and Madison.
They looked like broken dolls. Eleanor was wrapped in a shock blanket, staring blankly into space, her mouth slightly open, completely catatonic. Madison was huddled in the corner of the seat, weeping quietly, her hands covering her face. They had no home, no money, no social status, and no husband or father. The pristine, untouchable Vance legacy had been wiped off the face of the earth.
"What will happen to them?" I asked.
"Madison is taking a plea deal," Victoria explained. "Due to her minor involvement in the wire fraud, she'll serve two years in a minimum-security state prison, followed by five years of probation and mandatory community service. Eleanor isn't being charged criminally, but the bankruptcy courts have already issued orders to seize her remaining personal items—her jewelry, her clothes, her cars—to pay off Robert's creditors. She'll be living on basic state assistance in a public housing unit in Bridgeport."
Victoria paused, looking at me intently. "They have nothing left, Emily. You took every single thing they ever cared about."
I turned my head, staring at my reflection in the dark glass of the van window. The silver scar on my jaw gleamed faintly in the interior light.
"They kept the things that mattered," I said quietly. "They kept their lives."
"What are you going to do now?" Victoria asked. "The state settlement for your injuries and the civil suit against your father's estate will yield you roughly four million dollars once the liquidation clears. You can go anywhere in the world. You can start over."
I didn't answer immediately. I stepped out of the van into the cold rain, walking slowly across the muddy gravel toward the vehicle holding my mother and sister.
The federal agent guarding the car stepped aside as I approached. I tapped gently on the glass.
Madison looked up, her swollen eyes filling with fresh terror as she saw me standing there in the dark rain. Eleanor didn't even move, her vacant stare fixed on the dashboard.
Madison rolled down the window an inch, her voice trembling. "Are... are you going to send us to jail now? Is that what you came to see?"
I looked at my sister, then shifted my gaze to my mother. The intense, burning hatred that had consumed my soul for months—the fire that had driven me to destroy their lives—was completely gone. In its place was a vast, empty expanse of nothingness.
"I came to say goodbye," I said, my voice smooth and quiet against the falling rain.
Madison blinked, tears slipping down her cheeks. "Emily... please... we have no one left. When I get out... can we... can we ever be a family again?"
I looked at her for a long moment, remembering the sound of her laughter while I choked on my blood on the dining room floor.
May you like
"We were never a family, Madison," I said gently. "We were just people who lived in the same house and hated each other."
I turned my back on them and walked away, my heels crunching against the wet gravel, leaving them behind in the dark, freezing rain.
