Chapter 5 - The Ultimate Betrayal
I stared at the glowing screen of the burner phone, my mind completely rejecting the horrifying words.
"Daniel is dead," I argued desperately, pointing to the phone. "His plane exploded over the ocean."
Vance shook his head slowly, wiping a smear of dark blood from his bruised cheek.
"The syndicate must have completely faked the flight records to make us stop looking for him."
The reality that my husband was alive and actively ordering my brutal murder was almost too much to bear.
"We need to evacuate this entire hospital right now before they send a second assault team," Vance commanded.
He quickly grabbed a massive trauma bag from the destroyed medical cabinet to use as a temporary carrier.
We carefully wrapped the three crying babies in thick blankets and placed them securely inside the padded bag.
Vance handed me a loaded spare pistol from one of the dead assassins and taught me how to turn off the safety.
"If anyone other than me tries to take this bag, you shoot them without a single second of hesitation," he instructed firmly.
I gripped the cold, heavy metal of the gun, finding a fierce, maternal strength I never knew I possessed.
We quietly slipped out of the ruined hospital room and moved rapidly down the dark, smoky hallway.
The emergency stairwell was completely deserted, smelling heavily of sulfur and burnt electrical wiring.
We descended five flights of concrete stairs in absolute silence, heading directly toward the underground parking garage.
Vance carefully pushed the heavy fire door open and scanned the dimly lit concrete expanse.
His extraction vehicle was parked perfectly in the corner, but the driver was slumped lifelessly over the steering wheel.
Before we could even take a step toward the car, a bright spotlight violently illuminated our position.
"Drop the weapon, Mr. Vance," a terribly familiar, authoritative voice echoed through the vast garage.
My father stepped out from behind a large concrete pillar, casually holding a high-powered sniper rifle.
He was entirely surrounded by dozens of heavily armed men wearing the syndicate's tactical gear.
"You really thought Jason was the mastermind behind this entire operation?" my father laughed mockingly.
I stared at the man who had raised me, feeling absolutely nothing but pure, unadulterated disgust.
"Jason was just a pathetic, gambling addict who I perfectly used as a convenient scapegoat," my father bragged.
He proudly confessed that he was the one who had actually orchestrated the sale of my beautiful son.
"I needed the millions to cover my own massive corporate embezzlement before the feds found out," he admitted smoothly.
"And Daniel?" I asked, my voice trembling with a mixture of absolute fury and lingering heartbreak.
My father smiled a wicked, cruel smile and signaled to one of the armed guards standing near a black van.
The guard violently yanked the heavy sliding door open and forcefully kicked someone out onto the hard concrete.
A man entirely covered in blood, heavily chained, and barely breathing collapsed onto the dirty floor.
It was Daniel, looking absolutely nothing like the confident, wealthy traitor I had been led to believe he was.
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My father aimed his rifle directly at Daniel's head and looked back at me with cold, dead eyes.
"Daniel never sold your child, Maya," my father sneered. "I brutally tortured him for three days to forge that signature."
