Chapter 44: Marcus’s Message

The forty-eight-hour reprieve was a ticking bomb, each second a hammer falling on their nerves. The Shoreditch safehouse, once a refuge, had become a cage of frantic, fruitless activity. Sabe’s digital hunt for Vale Holdings AG had hit a wall of encrypted Swiss banking laws and corporate obfuscation so dense it seemed impenetrable. Anton paced, the weight of his crumbling empire a physical pressure on his chest. The board’s pitying, fearful faces were seared behind his eyelids. He could almost feel the walls of a sanitized, private hospital room closing in.

It was Mac, their grizzled pilot and occasional sentry, who broke the tension. He’d been making a supply run—food, cheap burner phones, batteries—and returned with a grim expression, holding a small, padded envelope.

“This was taped to the building’s main door,” he said, his voice a low rumble. “Addressed to ‘The Ghost and His Master.’ No postmark. Hand-delivered.”

Sabe was across the room in an instant, taking the envelope from Mac with a careful grip. He didn’t open it immediately. He examined it from every angle, his eyes narrowed. He brought it to his nose, inhaling subtly.

“No chemical scent. No obvious wires,” he murmured. He weighed it in his hand. “Light. Documents or a data device.”

“Open it,” Anton said, his voice tight.

With practiced, efficient movements, Sabe used a switchblade from his pocket to slice the envelope open. He tipped the contents onto the dusty surface of the crate they were using as a table.

A single, cheap, unregistered burner phone slid out. It was black, nondescript, the kind sold in bulk in every convenience store in the world. There was nothing else.

Anton stared at it, a cold dread coiling in his gut. This wasn’t a clue. This was a message.

The phone buzzed, vibrating against the wood. A single, shrill ringtone.

Sabe and Anton exchanged a look. This was the trap. Answering it could give away their location, exposing them to some digital trace. Ignoring it was to surrender the initiative completely.

Sabe picked up the phone. He didn’t answer. He connected it to one of his laptops via a cable, running a rapid diagnostic. “Isolated. No outgoing signal except for the one incoming data packet. It’s a one-time delivery system.”

The phone stopped ringing. A moment later, the screen lit up on its own. A video file, pre-loaded, began to play.

Sabe maximized the window on his laptop screen.

The video was shockingly high-definition. The setting was a sun-drenched terrace overlooking Lake Geneva, all crisp white linen and sparkling blue water. It was a world of obscene wealth and peace, a stark contrast to their dusty, fearful existence in London.

And there they were.

Evelyn Voss sat in a wicker chair, a glass of iced tea in her hand. She wasn’t looking at the camera, but off into the distance, a faint, satisfied smile on her lips, as if admiring her own handiwork. She looked utterly at ease, the queen surveying her new kingdom.

And leaning against the balustrade, directly facing the camera, was Marcus.

He looked healthier, more vital than Anton had seen him in years. The dissipated, bitter edge was gone, replaced by a sleek, triumphant cruelty. He was wearing a linen shirt, open at the collar, and he held a phone to his own ear, a perfect, mocking mirror of the device they were now holding.

“Hello, brother,” Marcus’s voice came through the laptop’s speakers, smooth as oiled silk. “I hope the accommodations in London are to your liking. A bit… bohemian for your tastes, I’d have thought. But then, you’ve had to lower your standards considerably, haven’t you?”

Anton’s hands clenched into fists at his sides. He could feel Sabe’s gaze on him, a steadying presence, but he couldn’t tear his eyes from the screen.

“We’ve been watching your little dance with great interest,” Marcus continued, his smirk widening. “The two of you, scurrying through the shadows. It’s almost touching. The mighty Anton Rogers, brought so low he has to hide behind a disgraced… What is he, exactly? A bodyguard? A pet?”

Sabe’s expression didn’t change, but a muscle in his jaw ticked. He was analyzing the background, the light, and any clue to their location.

“The board is so concerned about you,” Marcus said, his tone dripping with mock sympathy. “They think you’ve lost your mind. And who can blame them? Chasing ghosts. Aligning with criminals. It’s a tragic fall from grace.” He took a slow sip from a crystal tumbler. “But don’t worry. Evelyn and I are taking good care of everything. The ‘Aegis Resurrection’ project is proceeding beautifully. The future of the company is in very capable hands.”

He leaned closer to the camera, his face filling the screen, his eyes glinting with malice.

“It’s a shame you won’t be here to see it. But then, you always were more interested in Father’s legacy than in building a future of your own.” He paused, letting the venom sink in. “It’s almost time to put all this… unpleasantness behind us. The vote tomorrow will be a formality. A mercy, really.”

He smiled then, a wide, chilling expression of pure, unadulterated victory.

“So, what do you say, Anton? Family reunion soon?”

The video ended. The screen went black.

The silence in the safehouse was absolute, broken only by the frantic thumping of Anton’s heart. He was trembling, a fine, uncontrollable shake of pure rage and humiliation. The casual cruelty, the smug assurance, the way he spoke about Sabe—it was a psychological assault more devastating than any physical attack.

He felt a hand on his shoulder. Sabe’s grip was firm, grounding.

“He’s trying to provoke you,” Sabe said, his voice low and calm. “He wants you to make a mistake. To run to Geneva, guns blazing.”

“He called you a pet,” Anton choked out, the words tasting like ash.

“I’ve been called worse,” Sabe replied, his tone utterly matter-of-fact. He was already disconnecting the burner phone, sealing it in a Faraday bag to kill any further signals. His focus was absolute. “The video is a weapon. But it’s also a data point.”

“What data?” Anton asked, turning to him, his vision blurred with unshed tears of fury.

“He’s confident. Overconfident. He felt safe enough to send a gloating message. That means he feels his position is unassailable. He’s not hiding in a bunker; he’s on a terrace, in broad daylight.” Sabe’s eyes met Anton’s, and they were alight with a cold, analytical fire. “He gave us a location. Not an address, but a view. The angle of the sun, the architecture of the buildings across the lake, the flight path of that bird in the background… It’s not much, but it’s more than we had an hour ago.”

He turned back to his laptops, his fingers already flying, pulling up satellite imagery of the Geneva shoreline. “He wanted to demoralize us. But he got sloppy. Arrogance makes people sloppy.”

Anton watched him, the storm of his own emotions gradually being banked by the sheer force of Sabe’s focus. The message was meant to break him. But Sabe was treating it as a piece of the puzzle. He wasn’t dismissing Anton’s pain; he was channeling it.

“A family reunion,” Anton repeated, the words now laced with a new, grim purpose. He walked to the window, pulling the drape aside just enough to look out at the London skyline. The city that had once been his to command now felt alien. His real battle was across the water.

“He’s right about one thing,” Anton said, his voice quiet but steady now. “It is time for a family reunion.”

He turned to face Sabe. The despair was gone, burned away by a cold, clarifying fury. The boardroom rebellion, the psychiatric reports, the gloating video—they were all part of the same tapestry of betrayal.

“We’re not waiting for the forty-eight hours to run out,” Anton declared. “We’re not playing defense anymore. He’s invited us to the party.” A grim, determined smile touched his lips. “It would be rude to decline.”

Sabe looked up from his screens, a matching intensity in his gaze. He gave a single, sharp nod. The hunter and the strategist were in perfect accord.

The message had been received. And the answer was no longer one of panic, but of promise. The reunion was coming. But it would be on their terms. And it would be the last thing Marcus Vale ever expected.

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