Chapter 3 - The Bloodline of Iron
Elias didn't ask stupid questions. He didn't offer empty sympathies or waste time gasping in horror. That was the Vance bloodline. While my branch of the family had drifted into quiet agriculture and small-town logistics, Elias’s father had built a private security and intelligence firm that serviced Fortune 500 executives, foreign dignitaries, and high-net-worth individuals needing discreet protection.
"Give me thirty seconds," Elias said. I heard the rustle of papers and the click of a heavy office door closing. "Alright. Speak freely. Is the room swept?"
"No," I replied softly. "I'm in St. Jude Medical Center, Room 412. Christian just left. He thinks I'm unconscious."
"What happened, Genny?"
"It wasn't a random fan," I said, holding the phone tight against my cheek. "Christian paid a man named Marcus Vance—no relation to us—fifty thousand dollars to throw acid on my face. He did it so I couldn't show up to our wedding next week, allowing him to secretly marry his mistress, Sabrina, while retaining me as a public, helpless figurehead to protect his squeaky-clean image."
The line went completely silent for five full seconds. I could hear the faint sound of Elias's heavy breathing over the encrypted connection.
"Are you certain?" Elias asked, his voice dropping into a register so dark it sent a thrill of cold warmth down my spine.
"I overheard him discussing it with his manager, Gabriel, right at the foot of my bed," I said. "He also admitted to paying my fertility doctor, Dr. Lawson in West Carmel, to administer hormone suppressants that caused my three miscarriages over the past four years. He has a four-year-old son with Sabrina named Leo."
I heard the sound of glass shattering over the phone—Elias had crushed something on his desk.
"That motherfucker," Elias growled softly. "That pathetic, lip-syncing bastard."
"Elias, listen to me," I said firmly. "I don't want a quick police arrest. I don't want his lawyers working out a plea deal for third-degree assault while he sits in a private rehab facility claiming stress. I want his money, his freedom, his reputation, and his freedom stripped away permanently. I want him to watch everything he built turn into dust while he sits in a maximum-security prison."
"Now you sound like a true Vance," Elias said, his voice instantly shifting from anger to cold, tactical precision. "What's the immediate situation?"
"Gabriel is compromised," I explained. "I confronted him when he returned to the room. He's terrified of being named an accessory to attempted murder. He's currently on his way to a private hangar at Indianapolis International Airport to deliver twenty-five thousand dollars in cash to Marcus Vance before Vance boards a private flight to South America at 11:00 p.m. Gabriel is going to record Vance confirming the hit."
"Gabriel is an amateur," Elias countered sharply. "If Vance senses something is wrong, he'll kill Gabriel in that hangar and take the flight anyway. I have an operational team in Chicago. I can have four operatives at that hangar in two hours. We will intercept Vance, secure him quietly, and take custody of the cash and the recording."
"Can you do it without alerting the local police yet?"
"Indianapolis International's private general aviation terminal is owned by a subsidiary of one of my clients," Elias chuckled darkly. "My guys can walk through those security gates like they own the place. Vance won't make his flight. He'll be resting comfortably in a secure holding facility in Gary by midnight."
"Good," I said. "What about Dr. Lawson?"
"Lawson is small time," Elias said. "A corrupt medical practitioner taking bribes from celebrity clients to handle off-the-books procedures. I'll send a team to audit his digital server tonight. If he kept records on your 'treatments,' my tech boys will extract them before he finishes his morning coffee tomorrow."
"And Sabrina?" I asked. "The mistress."
"Sabrina Highsmith," Elias supplied instantly, the sound of his fingers flying across a mechanical keyboard echoing over the speaker. "Thirty-one years old. Former backup dancer for Christian's 2021 tour. Currently living in a gated community in Naples, Florida, in a four-million-dollar waterfront villa purchased through a Delaware LLC owned by Christian's holding company. She has a son, Leo, born four years ago at a private clinic in the Bahamas."
I squeezed my eyes shut for a brief moment, feeling the sharp sting of fresh betrayal. Four years. While I was weeping over blood-stained sheets in a hospital room in Chicago, Christian was flying to Naples to hold his newborn son.
"She's in on it," I stated.
"She's more than in on it," Elias said. "My records show she registered a marriage license application under her maiden name in Monroe County, Florida, three weeks ago. They scheduled a private civil ceremony for next Tuesday at an estate in Key West."
Next Tuesday. The exact day Christian and I were supposed to stand before five hundred guests at the Cathedral of St. Peter in Indianapolis.
"She wants the crown," I said softly.
"She wants the money, Genny," Elias corrected. "Christian's net worth is estimated at eighty-five million dollars, but fifty percent of his music publishing catalog rights are held in a joint marital trust that was set to activate upon his marriage to you. That was the prenuptial agreement your grandfather insisted on before he passed away, remember?"
The memory flashed back. My grandfather, old and ailing, sitting across from Christian in a mahogany office, staring down the ambitious young singer. “If you marry my granddaughter, half of your catalog royalties go into a irrevocable joint trust controlled by her. If you break her heart, she keeps the catalog.”
Christian had signed it five years ago because he was desperate for my grandfather's initial two-hundred-thousand-dollar investment to launch his first independent album.
He hadn't just attacked me to cover up his affair. He attacked me to prevent me from signing that final marriage certificate—which would have officially locked his publishing rights into my control—while keeping me legally tied to him through a modified conservatorship if I was declared mentally or physically incapacitated.
"He was going to declare me incompetent," I realized aloud, cold sweat breaking out across my collarbone. "He was going to use my facial trauma and psychological distress to seek power of attorney over me. He would control my trust, his catalog, and my life."
"Precisely," Elias said. "He wanted you locked in a golden cage, broken and silent, while he lived his double life with Sabrina and their son."
"Elias," I said, my voice hardening until it sounded like steel striking stone. "I need a doctor I can trust. Someone who can replace the staff in this hospital, keep Christian believing I'm still in a medically induced coma, and handle my reconstructive surgeries in complete secrecy."
"Dr. Evelyn Reed," Elias answered immediately. "She's the chief of trauma and reconstructive surgery at Northwestern in Chicago. She's also my wife's sister. She owes me her life after a medical malpractice defense I handled for her five years ago. I can have her private transport team at St. Jude in three hours. She will sign your transfer papers under a high-level security clearance."
"Do it," I said. "And Elias?"
"Yeah, kiddo?"
"Tell Dr. Reed not to hide the scars completely during the initial surgeries."
May you like
Elias paused. "Why?"
"Because when I stand in front of Christian Prescott again," I whispered, staring at my reflection in the dark glass of the hospital window, "I want him to see every single cent he paid for."
