His Mother Threw His 7-Months-Pregnant Wife Into the Pool—Then Attacked Him When He Rushed to Save Her! He Fought Back, Sending His Own Mother Crashing Through a Cocktail Bar. But Just When He Thought the Nightmare Was Over, His Wife Whispered Something That Made His Blood Run Cold...

The wind from the helicopter blades whipped the cold rain into a blinding frenzy as Ethan and Claire burst through the exterior double doors of the institute.

"Stop!" Ethan roared, his voice cutting through the roar of the turbine engines.

Arthur Vance turned slowly. At sixty-five, he looked like a slightly older, harsher version of Ethan himself—the same broad shoulders, the same piercing grey eyes, the same ruthless line to the jaw. He held June securely against his chest, wrapped in a dark cashmere scarf to shield her from the rotor wash. June was crying, reaching her tiny hands out toward the rain.

Beside Arthur, two private security contractors in tactical gear raised their submachine guns, leveling them directly at Ethan's chest.

"Hold your fire," Arthur commanded, raising a single gloved hand. His voice was deep, cultured, carrying effortless authority over the storm. "You don't shoot my son. Not after he went through so much trouble to bring my granddaughter to me."

"I am not your son," Ethan spat, stepping forward until the muzzle of the nearest contractor's weapon was pressing directly against his sternum. "Put June down, Arthur. Now."

"And let Daniel’s legal traps swallow everything our family built?" Arthur smiled, a cold, predatory expression that chilled Ethan deeper than the freezing rain. "Daniel was weak, Ethan. He let his guilt over Claire’s mother dictate his entire corporate strategy. He wanted to give four decades of shipping logistics to a foster child who paints watercolors!"

"That 'foster child' is his daughter!" Claire shouted, stepping up beside Ethan, her eyes blazing with a fury that made the nearest contractor hesitate. "And you murdered him for it! You had his steering lines cut!"

"I removed an obstacle," Arthur corrected smoothly, adjusting June in his arm. "Just as I had to remove Victoria’s influence. Poor Victoria. She always thought she could outplay me. When she realized I had hired a sniper to take Claire out at the pool, she threw Claire into the water to save her. A mother’s desperate instinct. But look where it brought you, Ethan. Right into my hands."

"You don't have the cylinder," Ethan said, pulling Daniel's cracked watch from his coat pocket and holding it up for Arthur to see. "You have the biometric authorization from Evelyn's hack, but the Swiss bank requires the physical bearer key. Without it, the Geneva servers will lock down permanently in two hours."

Arthur’s eyes narrowed slightly. "You have the coordinates?"

"I have the key," Ethan lied smoothly, holding up the flat titanium strip Victoria had given him. "You let Claire take June to the car. You and I fly to Zurich together. We open the vault. We split the logistics division fifty-fifty. But the baby stays with her mother."

Arthur looked at Ethan, studying his face with the cold, calculating eye of a veteran chess player. "A tempting offer, Ethan. A businessman's compromise. Truly, you have my blood."

Arthur took a step forward, extending his hand as if to accept the titanium key.

"Ethan, don't!" Claire cried out.

Ethan held his ground, his eyes locked onto Arthur's. As Arthur closed the distance, Ethan saw the subtle shift in the contractor’s posture—the slight tightening of the finger against the trigger.

They were never going to let Claire leave the tarmac alive.

In that fraction of a second, Ethan made his choice.

He didn't hand over the key. He didn't lunge for the baby.

Ethan dropped his shoulder, pivoted on his left heel, and slammed his entire body weight into the contractor holding the submachine gun, driving the man backward onto the slick concrete. The gun discharged wildly into the air, the crack of gunfire instantly swallowed by the roar of the helicopter blades.

"Claire, run!" Ethan roared, grappling with the guard on the ground.