Chapter 5: The Ashes
The visiting room at the Miami Metropolitan Correctional Center smelled of industrial bleach and stale sweat. I sat on a bolted metal stool, my posture perfect, wearing a bespoke, bone-white blazer that cost more than Richard’s defense attorney made in a year.
On the opposite side of the thick, smudged reinforced glass, Richard Hawthorne sat in a faded orange jumpsuit. The arrogant, untouchable shipping heir had been completely erased. In a matter of weeks, he had aged ten years. His skin was sallow, his hair thinning, his eyes darting with the manic energy of a cornered rat. He was facing decades in federal prison for attempted murder, wire fraud, and massive corporate embezzlement.
He picked up the heavy black receiver. His hand was shaking so badly he nearly dropped it.
“Maddie, please,” he begged, tears instantly streaking down his hollow cheeks. The sound of his voice—once a weapon he used to belittle me—was now just pathetic background noise. “Alexander’s lawyers are freezing my public defender’s assets. They’re blocking every motion. I have nothing. Victoria is dying in a county hospital; she needs a liver transplant we can no longer afford. My mother was evicted… she’s living in a motel by the highway.”
He pressed his hand against the glass, leaving a greasy print. “You won, Madeline. You destroyed us. Just… call off your brother. Give us enough to survive.”
I looked at him, searching my chest for a flicker of emotion. A decade ago, I would have broken. I would have felt pity. Now, I felt absolutely nothing. No anger, no sorrow, no triumph. Just the cold, clinical indifference one feels toward an insect they have just stepped on.
“You wanted my estate, Richard,” I said smoothly, my voice a quiet, lethal purr through the receiver. I stood up, gracefully buttoning my blazer. “Consider this your permanent residency.”
“Madeline, please! They’re going to kill me in here! The people I owe—”
I hung up the phone, cutting off his pathetic, wet sobs mid-sentence. I didn’t look back as I walked out of the visiting room, the heavy steel doors locking behind me with a satisfying, final clank.
I stepped out of the penitentiary and inhaled deeply, the humid Florida air tasting remarkably like freedom. I had shed my timid wardrobe, my submissive demeanor, and my false name. I was a sovereign entity once again.
A sleek, black armored SUV idled at the curb. As I approached, the heavy door swung open. Alexander’s head of security, a giant, scarred man named Vance, stepped out. He didn’t offer a polite greeting. He looked grim as he handed me a thick, black leather folder.
“Alexander thought you should see this immediately,” Vance said, his voice a low rumble.
I opened the folder in the glaring sunlight. Inside were high-resolution satellite photographs. They weren’t of a corporate office building. The coordinates pointed to a remote, mountainous region in Eastern Europe. The images showed a heavily fortified paramilitary compound, complete with armed patrols, reinforced bunkers, and a private airstrip.
A dossier attached to the photos confirmed the terrifying truth. Apex Holdings LLC wasn’t a shell company for tax evasion. It was a front for a highly organized, lethal mercenary syndicate. Richard hadn’t just borrowed money; he had promised them the Hawthorne shipping routes for weapons trafficking.
And because of my interference, the routes were gone.
I flipped to the last page. It was an intercepted digital ledger. My name was at the top, circled in red, next to a bounty that would make an assassin out of a saint.
