Chapter 7 - Blood and Broken Crystal
Arthur Dre walked slowly toward his son. He didn't yell. He didn't throw a punch. He looked at Matthias with the crushing, absolute disappointment that only a father can deliver.
“Get out of my house,” Arthur whispered.
“Dad, please—”
“You compromised this company. You compromised this family. And you put your pregnant wife in harm's way.” Arthur turned to Marcus Vance. “Agent Vance, do whatever you need to do.”
Marcus stepped forward with two state troopers.
“Matthias Dre, stand up and place your hands behind your back.”
“No!” Matthias yelled, suddenly lunging up from the armchair.
In a fit of panicked delirium, he didn't run toward the front doors—he lunged straight toward me.
“This is your fault!” he roared, his eyes wild with fury. “You ruined everything!”
He never touched me.
Before he could take two steps, Arthur swung his heavy mahogany walking cane with devastating force, striking Matthias across the shins.
Matthias crashed down onto the hardwood floor, knocking over a side table of champagne flutes. Crystal shattered into hundreds of glittering shards across the rug.
Within two seconds, three federal agents pinned Matthias face-down in the glass.
“Secure him!” Marcus commanded.
Matthias screamed as the steel cuffs snapped tightly around his wrists. Blood from a minor cut on his cheek smeared across the polished floorboards.
I stood there, three feet away, looking down at the man I had loved for almost a decade.
I felt no satisfaction. I felt no joy.
I only felt the steady, protective beat of my daughter’s heart inside me.
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“Take them both out,” Marcus ordered.
The federal agents hauled Matthias and Fiona to their feet and marched them through the front doors into the falling snow, where red and blue emergency lights were painting the estate grounds in flashing sirens.
