Chapter 41 - THE FOUR MARKS EXPLAINED
Nicholas’s gaze snapped toward the shadowed rear of the boiler house, where an enormous cast-iron hopper fed into the furnace chute.
Maria gasped, clutching Lucy against her chest.
Nicholas drew his sidearm, flicking off the safety with a silent click. He advanced toward the hopper, his boots making no sound on the soot-laden concrete. The smell was masked by coal dust and creosote, but as he neared the hopper’s hatch, the faint scent of antiseptic and clean linen met his senses.
He kicked the hatch open.
Inside the cavernous, iron-lined bin, lying on a military field cot, was a man.
An IV drip hung from a rusted support beam, running clear saline and antibiotics directly into his arm. The man was pale, his breathing shallow but steady, his torso wrapped in heavy medical gauze.
"Daniel," Nicholas breathed.
Daniel Santos’s eyes fluttered open under the beam of Nicholas’s tactical light. His face was gaunt, bruised, but he was alive.
"Nicholas..." Daniel rasped, his voice raw from dehydration. "She... she didn't kill me..."
Nicholas immediately checked the man’s pulse. Strong. Regular.
"Why did she put you here, Daniel?" Nicholas asked, his mind racing through the labyrinth of Isabella’s deception.
Daniel tried to rise, but Nicholas gently pushed him back down.
"She... she took Lucy’s blood sample," Daniel whispered, tears spilling into his graying beard. "To trigger the morning vault. But Victor... Victor’s men had already cornered me at the docks. They were going to butcher Lucy in front of me if I didn't give them the second key. Isabella arrived with her private security before Victor’s hitters could finish it. She staged the car in the river to throw off Victor’s hounds."
Nicholas froze.
He turned his head slowly toward the speakerphone lying on the crate.
Isabella’s voice purred through the line: "Did you really think I would hand Arthur’s granddaughter over to Victor, Nicholas? Or let the FBI put her into a federal holding facility where Victor’s bought judges could reach her?"
Maria stepped forward, her voice trembling. "Then why the bruise? Why terrorize a three-year-old child?"
"Because Victor had eyes inside the manor," Isabella said, her voice dropping into a razor-sharp whisper. "If Lucy came running to Nicholas laughing and safe, Victor would have known it was a trap. He would have stayed in his fortress. But a terrified child, begging for protection over a stolen cookie with bruises on her arm? Nicholas would tear the world apart to find the man who touched her. And Victor’s arrogance would draw him straight down into that culvert to watch the kill."
Nicholas looked down at his father. Victor’s face had drained of all color, the cruel smirk completely obliterated.
Victor had not set the ambush.
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Victor had walked into a slaughterhouse designed by the woman he thought was his creation.
***
