Chapter Nine: Ninety Seconds

Ethan’s whole body went cold and still, the way it used to go when Derek shoved him into the mud as a boy, that same instinct to freeze before deciding whether fighting back would make things worse.

“Do not,” Ethan said, voice low, forcing steadiness into it he did not fully feel. “Whatever you think I have done, hurting him does not get you anything you actually want.”

“It gets me your full attention,” Cassius said. “Which, at the moment, seems fixed rather stubbornly on those trees.”

Julius did not flinch with the gun at his temple, his jaw tight, eyes locked on Ethan with something that looked less like fear and more like fury directed entirely at himself. “Do not bargain with him,” Julius said. “Whatever he asks, do not give him more than you already have.”

“Quiet, old man,” Cassius said without looking at him. “Ethan. The real documents. Now. Or my associate here demonstrates exactly how little patience I have left for games.”

Ethan’s mind raced. Marcus had said ninety seconds from the tree line, and every second Ethan spent talking was a second closer to that window closing entirely. He needed Cassius’s attention on him, not on the woods, not on the gun at his grandfather’s head.

“I do not have the real documents,” Ethan said. “They are still in Whitfield’s possession. I was told to bring proof of good faith, not sign away my position on the spot. That was never the deal.”

It was not entirely true, but it was close enough to plausible that Cassius’s eyes narrowed, considering it.

“You expect me to believe Whitfield let you walk in here without the one thing that actually protects your grandfather’s life.”

“I expect you to believe Whitfield does not trust you any more than I do,” Ethan said. “He was not about to hand over binding legal transfer paperwork before confirming Julius was alive and unharmed. That was always going to be step two.”

Cassius studied him for a long moment, something calculating moving behind his composed expression. Whatever he might have said next was lost, because at that exact moment, the tree line erupted with motion.

Marcus’s team moved fast, faster than Ethan expected even after being told ninety seconds, dark shapes breaking from cover and closing the distance across the cracked runway in a controlled sprint. The man holding the gun to Julius’s head swung toward the sound, distracted for one critical second.

Ethan did not think. He moved.

He closed the gap between himself and the wheelchair in three strides, driving his shoulder into the gunman’s side hard enough to knock the weapon’s angle away from Julius’s head before it could fire. The gun went off anyway, the sound deafening inside the hangar, the bullet burying itself somewhere in the metal wall instead of his grandfather’s skull.

“Ethan!” Julius’s voice, sharp with alarm.

The gunman recovered fast, swinging an elbow that caught Ethan across the jaw hard enough to send white light sparking across his vision. He staggered back, tasting blood, but stayed on his feet, grabbing the man’s wrist and forcing the gun downward as they grappled for control of it.

Around them, the hangar filled with chaos. Marcus’s men were already engaging Cassius’s remaining guards, shouts and the scrape of boots against concrete echoing off the metal walls. Ethan caught a glimpse of Cassius backing toward a side exit, calm even now, unwilling to dirty his own hands with the fight breaking out around him.

“Do not let him leave,” Ethan shouted, still fighting for control of the gun, his opponent stronger than he looked, forcing Ethan’s arm back at an angle that sent pain shooting up through his shoulder.

Marcus peeled off from the main struggle and sprinted toward the side exit, but Cassius was already through it, disappearing into the grey early morning light outside.

Ethan finally wrenched the gun free, the man releasing it the moment Marcus’s second team member arrived to pull him bodily away, forcing him to the ground with practised efficiency. Ethan stood there for a moment, chest heaving, the weapon heavy and unfamiliar in his hand, blood trickling from a split lip he had not fully registered receiving.

“Julius.” He turned quickly, dropping to his knees beside the wheelchair. “Are you hurt?”

“I am fine,” Julius said, though his voice shook slightly, adrenaline and exhaustion both catching up to him at once. “You absolute fool. You were supposed to stay by the door.”

“You were supposed to stay in your hospital bed,” Ethan said, something close to a laugh escaping him despite everything, relief making his hands unsteady as he checked his grandfather over for injuries he could not see.

Marcus returned a moment later, breathing hard, expression grim. “Cassius is gone. Had a car waiting on the other side, we could not catch him before he cleared the property line. We have his two men in custody, but Cassius himself slipped through.”

Ethan’s relief curdled instantly into something harder. “Again.”

“Again,” Marcus confirmed. “He plans exits before he plans anything else. I should have accounted for that side door.”

Julius’s hand closed around Ethan’s wrist, grip weaker than it should have been but insistent all the same. “Listen to me. This is not over because he ran. A man like Cassius does not disappear after failing this badly. He regroups. He comes back angrier, and smarter about it.”

“I know,” Ethan said quietly.

“No,” Julius said, something urgent cutting through his exhaustion. “You do not, not yet. Because a man that humiliated does not simply return to the boardroom and wait patiently for the next opportunity. He will want to make sure his failure here costs you more than it cost him.”

Ethan’s phone buzzed against his hip, sharp and sudden in the aftermath of everything. He pulled it free, expecting Whitfield, expecting confirmation that the forged documents plan had worked exactly as intended despite everything else going wrong around it.

It was not Whitfield.

It was Sophia, and the message on the screen made Ethan’s blood run cold for the second time that morning.

Ethan. My mother just got a call. Someone matching Cassius’s description was seen outside Millbrook General twenty minutes ago, asking questions about my father’s room number. The doctors moved him already, but Ethan, he found us again. He knows exactly where we are.