Chapter 6 - The Unraveling
The air inside the panic room felt like toxic ash.
I sat on the cold steel floor, clutching Leo so tightly against my chest that he let out a tiny whimpering sound. Tears flowed down my face in silent, scalding rivers.
My whole marriage—the five years of quiet dinners, the oceanfront estate, the software empire, the foundation—was built on a pile of blood money. Eric wasn't just a protective husband keeping a secret to save my sister. He was a partner in the monster that was hunting us.
"Where is the baby, Whitaker?" Mercer demanded, raising a suppressed pistol, pressing the cold barrel directly against Eric’s forehead. "My buyers in Vancouver don't like loose ends. Julian’s son dies tonight."
"He's not here!" Eric lied, staring straight into Mercer's eyes, blood trickling down his jaw. "My security team took him north to Oregon two hours ago! Shoot me, Mercer! You won't find him!"
Mercer stared at Eric for three long seconds, evaluating the lie. A thin, terrifying smile spread across his scarred lips.
"Oregon," Mercer murmured. He slowly lowered the gun. "Very well. We will hunt him down in Oregon. But as for you, Mr. Whitaker... you've become far too much of a public nuisance."
Mercer nodded to the two tactical guards holding Eric.
One of the men pulled a heavy syringe filled with a clear liquid from his tactical vest, plunging it straight into the side of Eric’s neck.
Eric gasped violently, his eyes bulging as his body went rigid. Within ten seconds, his legs collapsed beneath him, and he fell heavily onto the carpet, his eyes rolling back into his head, paralyzed but conscious.
"A synthetic neurotoxin," Mercer explained calmly, stepping over Eric's helpless body. "It mimics a massive cardiac arrest. In two hours, the San Diego police will find the famous tech billionaire dead of a heart attack in his ruined bedroom. A tragic end to a complicated man."
Mercer turned his head, his eyes landing directly on the full-length mirror covering the closet door—staring right at the panic room where I was hiding.
May you like
My heart nearly leaped out of my chest.
"Search the rest of the grounds," Mercer ordered his men, turning on his heel toward the broken window. "Burn the house on your way out."
