Chapter 9 - The Corporate Arrest
The man in the rumpled suit wasn't one of the contract hitmen.
It was Arthur Sterling—the senior managing partner of the venture capital firm that funded Daniel’s division, and one of the largest political donors in the state of Virginia.
Sterling’s eyes darted nervously around the empty ballroom before landing on my grandfather, then on me. His face was a mask of furious, cornered desperation.
“This is an outrage!” Sterling shouted, his voice cracking slightly as the state troopers forced his hands behind his back and slapped cuffs around his wrists. “I am a major contributor to the governor’s reelection campaign! You have no jurisdiction to detain me based on some wild conspiracy concocted by a disgruntled military brat!”
“You’re being detained under federal anti-racketeering and corporate conspiracy statutes, Mr. Sterling,” Detective Harris announced calmly, holding up a warrant signed by a federal district judge. “We intercepted your encrypted comm-link with the sniper on the annex roof. The digital ping traces right back to your personal smartphone.”
Daniel, who had crept back into the ballroom behind the officers, stared at Sterling in absolute, horrified disbelief.
“Mr. Sterling?” Daniel gasped, stepping forward. “What is he talking about? You’ve been our firm’s primary partner for five years! This has to be a mistake—”
“Shut up, Daniel, you absolute idiot!” Sterling snarled, glaring at my brother with undisguised contempt. “Do you really think I hired you for your management skills? You were just a convenient, ambitious figurehead whose name looked good on the shell corporation paper trail!”
Daniel staggered backward as if he had been physically struck. The color drained entirely from his face. All the polished corporate arrogance, the condescending smiles, the smug superiority he had weaponized against me all evening—it all collapsed inward in a single, brutal second.
“No,” Daniel whispered, shaking his head. “That’s... that’s not true. I’m a vice president...”
“You’re a liability,” Sterling spat, before the state troopers hauled him firmly toward the exit.
I looked at my brother, watching the exact moment his entire reality shattered into pieces. Then I looked down at the leather folio in my grandfather’s lap.
May you like
The sniper outside had failed. The corporate front man had been exposed. But as my phone buzzed violently in my pocket with a new, encrypted alert from the Pentagon intelligence desk, I knew the head of the hydra was still out there.
---
