Chapter 8 - The Fall of the Traitor“Drop the box!” Marcus shrieked, his voice cracking into a panicked scream, waving his revolver wildly between Adrien and me.
“It’s over, Marcus,” I said, stepping in front of Adrien, holding my mother’s journal tightly in my arms. “The police have surrounded the entire block. Sokolov’s men are already in custody.”
“Shut up! Shut your mouth, Lena!” Marcus wept hysterically, his face pale and covered in sweat. “You ruined everything! I was going to be a senior partner! I was going to be a billionaire! Give me those drives or I swear to God I’ll put a bullet through your head right now!”
Adrien stepped smoothly in front of me, placing his body between Marcus’s gun and my heart.
He didn't pull his weapon. He simply walked toward Marcus with slow, deliberate, terrifying confidence.
“You’re going to shoot me, Blake?” Adrien asked, his voice dropping into a cold, lethal whisper that filled the vault. “Look at your hands. They’re shaking so badly you couldn't hit a wall from two feet away.”
“Stay back, Viscari!” Marcus screamed, pulling the hammer back on his revolver. “I’ll do it! I swear I’ll do it!”
“You’re a coward, Marcus,” Adrien said softly, stepping directly up to the barrel of the gun, pressing his chest against the cold steel. “You beat women in dark apartments because you’re too small to face real men. Shoot me.”
Marcus stared into Adrien’s glacial, unblinking eyes. The absolute, primal terror of facing the king of New York shattered what little sanity Marcus had left.
His hand trembled violently. His finger froze on the trigger. He couldn't do it.
With a lightning-fast strike, Adrien grabbed Marcus’s wrist, twisting it inward with a sharp, sickening snap.
Marcus let out a high-pitched shriek of agony, dropping the revolver onto the marble floor. Adrien grabbed him by his collar, smashing his face violently against the steel vault frame before throwing his limp body onto the ground at Detective Vance’s boots as tactical officers flooded the room.
Detective Vance snapped steel handcuffs around Marcus’s broken wrists.
“Marcus Blake,” Vance declared coldly. “You are under arrest for federal conspiracy to commit murder, extortion, and treason.”
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As officers dragged a weeping, bleeding Marcus away in chains, he turned his head toward me one last time, begging: “Lena... please help me!”
I looked at him with cold, detached disgust, turning my back on him forever.
