Chapter 17 - The First Contract
Arthur knew where the glass house was.
It wasn't at the burned estate.
It was at the abandoned Vance conservatory on the cliffs of Rhode Island, the ancestral home their father had locked up thirty years ago after Arthur’s mother committed suicide.
Arthur sped down the interstate, the speedometer needles pushing past ninety.
His mind was a battlefield of fragmented memories.
He remembered the endless fights between his father and Julian behind closed mahogany doors.
He remembered his mother whispering warnings in the garden, telling Arthur never to drink the tea Julian poured.
He had thought it was the rambling of a sick woman losing her mind.
Now, the terrifying puzzle pieces were slamming together.
His mother hadn't been insane.
She had uncovered the truth about what the Vance family actually did with their shipping containers—the private auctions, the human collateral, the forged identities.
And Eleanor wasn't just a random woman Arthur met at an art gallery.
She had been a prisoner of the family long before Arthur ever laid eyes on her.
Her car crash, her amnesia, her sudden appearance in Arthur’s life—it hadn't been fate.
It had been an assignment.
Julian had planted Eleanor in Arthur's life to keep her under surveillance while Julian staged his own death to escape federal indictment.
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Arthur slammed his fists against the steering wheel, a scream of pure agony tearing from his throat.
His entire marriage, his daughter, his happiness—everything had been a calculated lie scripted by his dead brother.
