Chapter 8 - The Fall
The very moment my pen left the paper, Charles's expensive smartphone vibrated violently in his pocket.
Then it buzzed again, followed by a continuous, frantic stream of high-priority banking alerts ringing out in the basement.
The fraud clause Lucas had secretly established years ago had just been fully and irreversibly triggered.
Every single bank account, stock portfolio, and offshore trust associated with Charles Baldwin was instantly frozen by international regulators.
All of his hidden assets, sprawling properties, and complex shell companies were simultaneously seized by federal authorities.
He was completely, undeniably bankrupt in a matter of seconds.
Charles screamed in blind, unhinged fury and lunged violently toward me with his bare hands.
Lucas didn't hesitate for a fraction of a second, tackling my father mid-air with the force of a freight train.
They crashed brutally into the heavy metal shelving units, knocking heavy steel tools and spare parts to the concrete floor.
Charles was significantly older, but he fought with the terrifying, desperate strength of a completely ruined man with nothing left to lose.
He managed to gain the upper hand, pinning Lucas to the ground and raising a massive steel wrench high above his head.
I frantically grabbed a heavy red fire extinguisher from the wall mounting beside the doorway.
I swung the heavy metal cylinder with everything I had left in my exhausted, pain-wracked body.
The bottom of the extinguisher connected solidly with the back of Charles's skull with a sickening crunch.
He instantly collapsed onto the cold concrete floor like a heavy sack of bricks, entirely unconscious.
The electronic detonator rolled out of his limp hand and skidded to a halt near a floor drain.
I carefully picked up the device, my hands shaking so violently I could barely hold it straight.
The small LED light on the top of the detonator wasn't glowing, and there was no battery pack attached to the casing.
Lucas quickly examined the loose wires dangling pathetically from the bottom of the plastic device.
He looked up at me, his eyes wide with a sudden, terrifying realization.
May you like
The detonator in my hand was a complete fake, but the bricks of C4 strapped to the main oxygen tanks were very real.
They were wired to a completely independent, physical digital timer hidden behind the pipes, and it was currently counting down from thirty seconds.
