Chapter 5 - The Bloodline Clause
My knees almost buckled in the mud.
*Julian.*
My younger brother. The kid I had put through Harvard Business School. The brother I had named vice chairman of Mercer Global after our father passed. When Claire died, Julian had cried harder than anyone at the funeral. He had held Lily in his arms and promised me he would protect our family forever.
It was all a lie. A calculated, psychopathic play for everything my father had built.
Vanessa climbed into the Sikorsky. The twin turbine engines whined to life, drowning out the sound of the rain. The rotors blurred, lifting the heavy aircraft into the coastal fog, banking north toward Boston.
I sprinted onto the dock.
Grant lay in the rain, blood bubbling from his lips. His eyes fluttered as my shadow fell over him.
"Daniel..." he choked out, clutching his chest. "She... she double-crossed me..."
"Where is the master drive, Grant?" I grabbed his jacket, hauling his torso up. "She took the star. What was Julian's role in this?"
Grant coughed, spitting dark crimson onto the wood. "The will... Claire’s will... Julian buried it..."
"What will?"
"Claire didn't leave her Mercer shares to you... or the board," Grant wheezed, his fingers digging into my arm. "She left sixty percent... outright to Lily. Trust funds locked... until Lily turns five. If Lily dies before her fifth birthday... the entire estate defaults to Julian and Vanessa's joint fund."
My breath caught in my throat.
Lily’s fifth birthday was this Sunday. In forty-eight hours.
"They've been planning this for two years," I whispered, the sickening timeline burning into my brain. They killed Claire to start the clock, waited for Vanessa to marry me to gain legal standing, and were now eliminating Lily hours before the trust locked permanently out of their reach.
"The... safe..." Grant gasped, his pulse fluttering erratically under my hand. "Julian’s penthouse... the original will... and Claire’s lab results... are in his vault. Code... is Claire’s death date... 0-9-1-4..."
Grant’s head snapped back. His eyes rolled into his head, staring blankly up into the pouring rain. His chest stopped moving.
I stood up, the rain washing the blood from my jacket.
My phone vibrated. A text from Marcus:
*I’m at the secondary extraction point. We have a secure medical transport ready for Lily. Get to the coordinates now.*
I sprinted back through the woods to our launch. Owen was sitting beside Lily’s bunk, gently stroking her forehead. Her color had improved; she was sleeping peacefully under the blankets.
"Did you get the drive?" Owen asked, his face pale with anxiety.
"No," I said, cutting his zip-ties with my tactical knife. "Vanessa has it. And my brother Julian is running the board."
Owen gasped, clutching his chest. "Julian? But he was the one who insisted Claire's body be cremated so quickly—"
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"Pack your gear," I cut him off, picking up Lily in my arms. "We’re going to Boston. And by Sunday morning, I’m burning their empire to the ground."
***
