Chapter 6 - THE SINS OF THE FATHER
The great hall of Blackwood Manor was lit only by three hundred white candles.
Outside, the storm had reached its peak.
Thunder rattled the leaded glass windows, shaking the heavy crystal chandeliers.
In the center of the flagstone floor, two wooden chairs had been placed facing the fireplace.
Sloane Mercer was forced into the left chair.
Her wrists were bound behind her with heavy zip-ties.
Her scarlet dress was torn at the shoulder, soaked with rain and sweat.
Callum Voss sat in the right chair.
His hands were free.
Nobody had tied him.
Nobody needed to.
His sons stood behind him like granite statues, cutting off every escape route.
At the top of the grand curved staircase, a door clicked open.
Footsteps descended.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Rosalind walked down into the candlelight.
She wore a gown of midnight blue velvet that brushed the stone steps.
Around her neck, where diamonds usually sat, hung a simple silver chain with an antique brass compass.
Julian’s compass.
The one he had carried on his yacht the day he was burned alive.
Callum looked up.
When his eyes saw the compass, his breath caught in his throat.
He buried his face in his hands.
"Look at me, Callum," Rosalind commanded.
Her voice filled every shadow of the massive hall.
Callum did not lift his head.
"I said look at me!"
Beckett stepped forward and yanked Callum's head back by his silver hair.
Not hard enough to break skin, but hard enough to force his eyes open.
Callum was weeping.
Real, ugly tears of shame.
"Rosalind," Callum choked out. "I didn't want him to die."
"I swear to you on the souls of our sons, I never wanted Julian dead."
Rosalind stopped two feet from his chair.
She reached down and took the digital printout Piers had handed her.
She held it before Callum's eyes.
"Then explain this signature," she said.
"Explain why the thermite that melted my brother's bones was bought with your private account."
Callum swallowed, his chest heaving like a wounded animal.
He looked sideways at Sloane.
Sloane was staring at the floor, her breathing shallow and terrified.
"It was Arthur Mercer," Callum whispered.
"Sloane's father."
"Twenty years ago, Arthur was running stolen weapons through the southern railyards."
"Julian found the crates."
"Julian was going to the federal prosecutor."
"He was going to bring down the Blackwood name to keep his own conscience clean."
Callum’s voice cracked into ragged pieces.
"Arthur came to me in the middle of the night."
"He told me that if Julian went to the feds, the entire organization would collapse."
"We would all go to prison for life."
"I gave Arthur the money to buy Julian a new boat."
"I told Arthur to get him out of the country!"
"I told him to send Julian to Argentina until the heat blew over!"
Callum’s tears dripped onto his black silk collar.
"Arthur lied to me."
"He took my money, bought military thermite, and rigged the fuel tanks."
"When the boat exploded in the harbor, Arthur called me."
"He said: Now you're the only heir left, Callum. Now you marry the Blackwood girl and we split the city."
Rosalind’s face did not move.
Not a single muscle twitched.
"And you stayed silent," Rosalind said.
"You let me grieve for twenty years."
"You let me lay flowers on an empty grave while you took his seats on the boards."
"I did it for us!" Callum cried out, his voice echoing off the stone walls.
"I did it to protect our sons!"
"If I killed Arthur back then, his faction would have started a blood feud that would have murdered Gideon in his crib!"
"So you buried the truth," Rosalind said.
"And then, twenty years later, you took Arthur's daughter into your bed."
Callum closed his eyes.
"She knew," Callum whispered.
"Arthur died of cancer three years ago."
"Before he died, he gave Sloane the original bank receipts."
"She came to my office fourteen months ago."
"She said if I didn't give her fifty percent of the logistics routes, she would give the papers to you."
"She blackmailed you?" Beckett snarled from behind the chair.
"And your answer was to sleep with her?"
"I was trying to keep her close!" Callum sobbed.
"I was trying to find the original files before she could destroy this family!"
"You fool," Rosalind said.
The word was like a knife sliding into his ribs.
"You pathetic, arrogant fool."
She turned toward Sloane Mercer.
Sloane looked up, her lips trembling.
"Is that true, Sloane?" Rosalind asked.
Sloane gave a wild, hysterical laugh.
"Every word," Sloane hissed.
"My father spent his life in Callum's shadow!"
"He did Callum's dirty work, and Callum got the mansions, the suits, the empire!"
"I came to collect what was owed to the Mercer name!"
"And you," Sloane sneered at Rosalind, "you were so busy playing the dignified queen that you didn't even notice your husband rotting from the inside out!"
Rosalind took one step closer to Sloane.
She reached out.
Her palm was open.
The room held its breath.
Every son waited for the slap that would answer the one from the ballroom.
Instead, Rosalind’s hand stopped an inch from Sloane's face.
She reached past Sloane's cheek and plucked the diamond pendant from Sloane's neck.
The chain snapped with a brittle metallic ping.
"My husband bought this with my mother's dividend," Rosalind said, dropping the diamonds onto the flagstones.
She stepped on them.
The crystal cracked beneath her heel.
"You thought you were a player in this game, Sloane."
"You thought you were an architect."
"You are nothing more than a stray dog that wandered into a wolf's den."
Suddenly, the red emergency sirens across the compound began to shriek.
The lights flickered and plunged into darkness.
The heavy iron front gates were torn apart by an explosive blast that shook the foundation of the manor.
Through the broken windows, the sound of heavy diesel engines roared up the private driveway.
Piers’s tablet glowed in the dark.
"Mom," Piers shouted over the sirens.
"Dante Sterling is here."
"He brought eighty men and three armored transports."
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"They're not here to talk."
"They're here to slaughter everyone inside."
