Chapter 4 - The Shadow of Harrison Vance
The clock in the central foyer of the Drummond mansion struck nine with a solemn, metallic chime.
The grand front doors opened, and Harrison Vance stepped into the hall. He was fifty-eight years old, immaculate in a three-piece Italian suit, carrying a sleek leather briefcase. He had served as the chief legal counsel for Drummond Holdings for three decades, a man whose polished charm and smooth voice had smoothed over a hundred corporate crises.
“Edward?” Harrison called out, setting his wet umbrella in the brass stand by the door. “The rain out there is brutal. I brought the tax filings for the harbor development project—”
He stopped.
The foyer was pitch black. The massive crystal chandelier that usually illuminated the three-story marble staircase was dark.
Sitting in a high-backed leather armchair in the center of the dark hall, lit only by the gray morning light filtering through the stained-glass windows, was Edward Drummond.
On the small mahogany table beside his elbow sat the blue velvet box.
Harrison’s smile faltered for a fraction of a second, so quickly that an ordinary man would have missed it. But Edward didn't miss it. He saw the subtle tightening around Harrison’s eyes, the sudden halt in his stride, the way his fingers tightened on the handle of his briefcase.
“Edward?” Harrison asked, taking a slow step forward. “Why are the lights off? Is something wrong with the generator?”
“Where is my son, Harrison?” Edward asked.
His voice wasn't loud. It didn't carry the theatrical roar of an angry man. It was flat, cold, and heavy as a lead weight falling onto marble.
Harrison froze. The color drained from his face so fast it looked as if his blood had been instantly siphoned away.
“Edward... what are you talking about?” Harrison stammered, attempting a forced, nervous laugh. “Your son? You know Sarah lost the baby twenty-five years ago. You’ve been over this with the grief counselors—”
Edward didn't say a word. He simply reached down and picked up the blue velvet box. He flipped the latch open and tossed the crumpled plastic hospital bracelet across the marble floor.
It slid across the polished stone, stopping precisely at the toe of Harrison’s polished wingtip shoe.
Harrison stared down at the faded bracelet. The air in the foyer seemed to thin out, becoming suffocatingly dense.
“Julian escaped last night, Harrison,” Edward said, leaning forward in his chair, resting his forearms on his knees. “He threw his child over my garden wall. My grandson is currently sleeping in my master bedroom upstairs.”
Harrison took half a step backward toward the front door. His smooth, aristocratic posture collapsed into something sharp, rat-like, and desperate.
“You don't know what you're talking about,” Harrison whispered, his hand drifting toward his coat pocket.
“Don't,” Edward warned softly.
From the dark shadows of the second-floor balcony, four red laser dots appeared simultaneously on Harrison’s chest, glowing like crimson embers against his dark grey suit.
Knox stepped out from the shadows of the drawing room, holding a heavy suppressed pistol.
Harrison dropped his briefcase. It hit the floor with a dull thud.
“It wasn't just me, Edward!” Harrison shrieked, his voice breaking into a high, pathetic pitch. “It was Victor! Your uncle Victor planned the whole thing! He said you were too soft, too focused on Sarah, too willing to give away the family fortune to charity foundations! We needed control of the voting stock!”
“Where is my son?” Edward repeated, his voice dropping into a register that vibrated through the floorboards.
Harrison swallowed hard, his eyes darting frantically toward the dark windows. “Victor’s men caught up with him at the docks near Pier 4! They have him at the old grain silo! Victor is going to put him on a freighter to South America this morning—or put him in the harbor if he keeps fighting!”
Edward slowly stood up from his chair. At six-foot-two, with his broad shoulders and icy blue eyes, he looked less like a corporate executive and more like an executioner stepping onto the scaffold.
He walked over to Harrison, stopping two inches from the lawyer’s trembling face.
“Twenty-five years,” Edward whispered into Harrison’s ear. “I gave you a home. I gave you tens of millions of dollars. I trusted you with my family’s memory.”
“Edward, please! We were brothers!” Harrison wept.
Edward reached out, grabbed Harrison by his silk tie, and hauled him toward the front door like a bag of trash.
“Knox,” Edward commanded.
“Sir?”
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“Put him in the back of the SUV. If my son has a single scratch on him when I reach Pier 4, break one of Harrison’s fingers every ten seconds until he tells us where my sister Clara is.”
“With pleasure, Mr. Drummond.”
