Chapter 4

The words coming out of the speaker didn’t make sense. They couldn’t.

‘My mother?’

My mind violently rejected the thought. My mother, Eleanor, was supposed to be fading away in a private medical suite, her heart failing, her body kept alive only by the thousands of dollars of machinery Alexander had just agreed to fund.

She was the reason I had swallowed my pride and walked into Alexander’s office in the first place. She was the only family I had left.

“That's a lie,” I breathed, my voice barely a whisper against the dark fabric of Alexander’s jacket. I pulled away from him, staring at the partition speaker as if I could force Marcus to take the words back.

“Marcus, look again. You made a mistake. My stepfather, Victor, hates her! He’s the one who ran her into debt. She would never ally with him, and she would never touch Leo!”

“The paper trail doesn’t lie, Elena,” Alexander said. There was no shock or confusion in his voice. He sounded calm, cold, and without emotions. 

The warmth that had briefly touched his hands when he wrapped his coat around me was gone. He looked at me not like a husband, or even a protector, but like a judge passing a sentence.

“Marcus,” Alexander commanded, his eyes never leaving my face. “Pull up the medical facility’s security log for the last forty-eight hours.”

“Already on your screen, sir,” Marcus replied.

The tablet mounted to the back of the front seat glowed to life. I leaned forward, my hands trembling so violently I could barely focus on the screen.

It was a high-definition video feed from the VIP wing of the St. Jude Medical Center.

The timestamp showed yesterday afternoon, 3:00 PM.

There she was. My mother. The same woman I had cried over just three days ago, lying unconscious under all those breathing tubes.

On the video, she was sitting upright in bed, completely unhooked from the machines. She was laughing.

Next to her, sitting on the edge of the mattress with a smooth and stylish leather briefcase, was my stepfather, Victor Vance. They weren’t fighting. He was pouring her a glass of champagne.

Then, Victor handed her a document. She signed it boldly, smiling up at him with a greedy, calculating look I had never seen on her face before.

“She faked it,” I whispered as the truth hit me hard. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach. My breath left me, and a sick, empty pain spread through my chest. “The failing heart... the debts... the whole thing was a setup.”

“It was a trap,” Alexander said, his deep male voice breaking through my sadness.

“Victor knew he couldn’t get to my brother’s estate directly. He knew I was looking for the surrogate. So he used you. He played on your guilt, made you believe your mother was dying, and drove you straight into my path so you would sign that marriage contract.”

“No, no…” I shook my head, tears finally spilling over my lashes. “If they wanted the marriage contract, why kidnap Leo? Why threaten the company?”

“Because the marriage contract was just phase one,” Alexander explained, leaning forward, his shadow swallowing me once more.

“Phase one got you into my inner circle. It gave your family access to my security codes through the legal paperwork you signed. But they got greedy. Once they realized they could use Leo to extort the shipping software keys directly, they threw you to the wolves.”

He reached out, his hand gripping my jaw again. This time, there was no seductive tenderness. His fingers dug into my skin, forcing me to face his terrifying, dark anger.

“Your mother sold you out, Elena. She sold out your son. And you brought them right to my doorstep.”

“I didn’t know!” I cried, grabbing his wrist, trying to pull his hand away. “Alexander, I swear to you on my life, I didn’t know! I love my son. I would rather die than let Victor touch him!”

Alexander stared deep into my eyes, searching for a lie. The tension in the back of the Maybach was unbearable, filled with betrayal, anger and a desperate emotion neither of us understood.

For one long, painful moment, I honestly thought he was going to open the door and throw me out into the heavy rain. I was the stepdaughter of his enemy. I was a liability.

Gradually, his hold on my jaw loosened but he didn't pull away. Instead, his hand slid down the side of my neck, heavy and warm against my skin.

His thumb came to a stop right in the center of my throat, pressing gently against the hollow of my collarbone.

“If I find out you are part of this, Elena,” he whispered, his face so close his lips almost touched mine, “I won't destroy your stepfather. I will make sure you regret ever crossing me."

“I’m innocent,” I said, looking directly into his stormy eyes. “Just save Leo. Please. Use me, do whatever you want to me, just get him back.”

Alexander looked at me a bit longer, his eyes dropping on my lips before he pulled back completely, adjusting his cuffs. The Ice King was back, fully in control.

“Marcus,” Alexander called out. “Change of plans. We aren’t going to the Brooklyn port area tomorrow. We’re going tonight. If Victor and Eleanor think they have twenty-four hours, they’re relaxed. We catch them before they can secure the area.”

“Sir, the encryption keys aren’t ready,” Marcus warned.

“I don't need the keys,” Alexander replied coldly. “I am the key.”

He turned back to me, his eyes dark and dangerous, shining with a warning that sent fear through me.

“You said you’d do anything, Elena. Put your shoes back on. We are going to pay your parents a visit.”

The Maybach tore through the rainy night, leaving the highway and diving into the dark, abandoned industrial district of the Brooklyn waterfront.

The warehouses here looked old and forgotten, their huge rusted iron walls standing over the dark, rough waters of the Atlantic.

We stopped a block away from Warehouse 14. The rain has slowed to a cold, miserable drizzle, while thick fog rolled off the river like smoke in the dark.

Marcus opened the glove compartment and handed Alexander an elegant black handgun.

Alexander took it like a man who had held one too many times before. He checked it quickly, calmly, with a kind of practiced ease that made my stomach twist.

Then he slipped it beneath his suit jacket, tucking it into the waistband of his trousers as if it belonged there.

“You stay behind me,” Alexander ordered, looking down at me as we stepped out into the damp, cold air. “If things go sideways, you run back to the car. Marcus will protect you.”

“I’m not running away without Leo,” I said, my voice becoming harsh.

The initial shock of my mother’s betrayal was fading, replaced by a cold, protective anger.

They had used me, hurt my nanny and taken my baby. I was done crying.

Alexander looked at me, a brief flash of something resembling respect crossing his face before it went blank again.

“Let’s go.”

We moved like ghosts through the shadows, slipping through a rusted side door Marcus had quietly opened carefully using force.

Inside, the warehouse was massive, smelling of salt, rust, and old oil.

High above, a few dim yellow lights hung from the roof beams, casting long, twisted shadows across the concrete floor.

In the center of the warehouse, under a single bright spotlight, sat a wooden chair. My heart jumped into my throat.

Sitting in the chair, wrapped in his blue knitted blanket, was Leo.

His little thumb was put tightly inside his mouth, his eyelashes wet from crying but he was currently asleep, exhausted from the terror of the night.

Standing right behind him, holding a heavy cane, was Victor Vance.

And sitting on a plush leather sofa brought into the dirty warehouse just for her comfort was my mother, Eleanor, sipping from a crystal glass.

“Look at that,” Victor’s voice echoed through the roof beams as we stepped into the light.

He didn’t look surprised to see us. In fact, he smiled. The Ice King actually has a heart. Or maybe he just really wants his brother’s software keys.

“Victor,” I hissed, taking a step forward, but Alexander’s arm hit across my chest, stopping me in my tracks.

“Where are the keys, Alexander?” my mother asked, her voice smooth, without any weak, struggling tone she had used on her ‘deathbed.’

She didn't even look at me. Her eyes were fixed entirely on Alexander’s wealth.

“Give us the drive and you can take the girl and the bastard. We’ll even let you keep your little fake marriage.”

Alexander stepped forward, shielding me with his body. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a modern-looking silver flash drive, holding it up between two fingers.

“The keys are right here. Every port code from New York to Rotterdam. But you aren’t leaving this warehouse with them.”

Victor chuckled, tapping his cane against the concrete.

“I think I am, Alexander. Because if you make a single move, my associate in the roof beams puts a bullet through your nephew’s head.”

A red laser dot suddenly appeared, dancing across the front of Leo’s blue blanket, right over his tiny chest.

“No!” I screamed, trying to rush forward, but Alexander caught my waist, pulling me tightly against his back.

“Trade,” Victor demanded, holding out his hand.

“Throw the drive across the floor, or the kid dies right now.” Alexander looked down at the drive, then up at the roof beams.

There was absolute silence, it was so thick and heavy I could hear the rain tapping against the tin roof. Then, Alexander did something that made my blood run cold.

He didn’t throw the drive. He lowered his hand, looked directly at Victor, and let out a dark, chilling laugh.

“Do it,” Alexander said smoothly. I froze, staring at the back of his head with extreme fear. What did he just say?

“Alexander, what are you doing?!” I screamed, desperately grabbing and pulling at his back. Alexander didn’t turn around.

His voice was steady, harsh and completely cold.

“You think you can blackmail me with a child, Victor? I am the head of Blackwood Global. This software is worth fifty billion dollars. Do you really think I would trade the security of the western hemisphere for a brother’s bastard I didn’t even know existed until an hour ago?”

Victor’s smile faltered, his eyes widening slightly. “You're only pretending. He’s your blood.”

“He’s a liability,” Alexander snapped, taking a step away from me, leaving me standing alone in the light.

He looked at my mother, his eyes completely hollow.

“Kill the boy if you want. It just means the estate stays entirely mine. But the moment that gun goes off, Marcus and the federal agents surrounding this building will turn both of you into Swiss cheese.”

My mother stood up from the sofa, her face turning pale as she looked around the dark warehouse.

“Alexander... wait…”

“Elena,” Alexander said, his voice dropping to a low, commanding whisper as he kept his eyes on Victor.

“Choose right now. Your son, or your life.”

Before I could even process the words, the red laser dot shifted off Leo’s chest and locked directly onto the center of my forehead.