Chapter 8 - The Boy Speaks
Julian suddenly let out a sharp, choked gasp, knocking the crystal glass out of my hand.
The glass fell to the thick rug, spilling clear water across the fibers, but none of us paid it any mind.
My brother's eyes were locked onto the open double doors of the playroom, staring past the broad shoulders of the security guards.
His face had drained of every drop of color, leaving his skin as pale as the chalk dust covering his shirt.
"Julian, what is it?" I asked, gripping his trembling hands tightly between my own.
"Are you in pain? Tell me what hurts!"
He did not look at me; he could not tear his gaze away from the obsidian shadows pooling in the private hallway outside.
His chest heaved up and down in frantic, erratic spasms as if invisible hands were tightening around his throat.
"Dad..." Julian whispered, the word barely carrying across the room over the hum of the electronics.
Arthur was at his son's side in an instant, dropping onto one knee and taking Julian's face between his broad, dust-covered palms.
"I'm right here, son," Arthur said with intense tenderness.
"Nobody is ever going to hurt you again; you are safe, I swear it on my life."
"No... you don't understand..." Julian stammered, fresh tears spilling over his bruised eyelids.
"When they grabbed me... down in the private parking garage... Martha wasn't the one who held the syringe to my neck."
A suffocating stillness descended upon the entire room.
Marcus's hand dropped instinctively to the textured grip of his sidearm, his tactical earpiece hissing with low static.
Arthur's breath caught in his throat, his piercing blue eyes widening with profound, horrifying realization.
"What did you say, Julian?" Arthur asked, his voice shaking with an emotion none of us had ever heard from him before: fear.
"She wasn't alone, Dad," Julian wept, his body convulsing with uncontrollable tremors.
"There was a man with her... someone who had your master security override keycard..."
Martha let out another harsh, cackling laugh from the iron chair by the fireplace.
"Shut her up, Thomas!" Marcus barked, his eyes darting toward the corridor.
Thomas clamped a heavy, gloved hand over the housekeeper's mouth, cutting off her laughter into muffled, venomous snorts.
Julian slowly raised his right arm, his trembling index finger pointing directly through the doorway toward the dim hallway.
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"He's still inside the penthouse, Dad," Julian cried out in pure terror.
"He was waiting by the master suite until the alarms went off!"
