Chapter 36 - The Dying Architect
Richard Sterling stirred in the hospital bed, his frail chest hitching against the rhythmic hiss of the ventilator. His rheumy, yellowed eyes fluttered open, locking onto Ethan with an agonizing mixture of shame and relief.
"Ethan..." Richard wheezed, his dry lips cracking as he attempted to lift a skeletal hand. "You... you came."
"Save your breath, Richard," Genevieve said without looking at him, her tone carrying the indifferent boredom of an aristocrat swatting away a fly. "You spent fifty years failing to build an empire that could survive without my capital. You don't get to play the tragic patriarch now."
Ethan stepped past her, deliberately refusing to acknowledge her presence, and stood at the bedside. He looked down at the man who had abandoned him to Margaret’s venomous claws.
There was no rage left in Ethan’s chest for this broken creature—only the cold, surgical detachment of a judge viewing a condemned man.
"You put me in that house," Ethan said, his voice quiet, vibrating through the quiet room. "You gave Margaret the whip and told her to keep me down. Why?"
A single, thick tear tracked through the wrinkles of Richard’s cheek. "Because... if she saw you... she would have recognized the blood. She would have molded you... into her weapon. Like she did... to the others."
Ethan frowned. "The others?"
Genevieve let out a sharp, aristocratic laugh that made the fine crystal vases on the sideboard ring. "He means your brothers, darling. Did you really think you were the only experiment? Richard had four sons across Europe before he met me. Three of them were weak. They broke under pressure, lost their minds in boarding schools, or drank themselves to death in Monaco. You were the only one who survived the crucible."
Olivia stepped forward, her eyes blazing with fury, stepping between Genevieve and Ethan. "Crucible? He was a child! Margaret starved him, locked him in closets, humiliated him before everyone we knew! You call that a crucible?"
Genevieve’s gaze drifted lazily up Olivia’s figure, evaluating her coat, her jewelry, and the fire in her eyes with chilling amusement. "And who is this little bird? Ah, yes. The Sterling-Vance charity case. Olivia. The daughter of the man who sold his daughter to Julian to cover his gambling debts on the Singapore exchange."
"My father didn't sell me," Olivia spat, her fists clenching at her sides. "He was blackmailed!"
"By me, sweetheart," Genevieve smiled, tapping her manicured nails against her tea saucer. "I held your family's debt for twenty years. I gave it to Margaret to use as leverage against you, so that Ethan would be forced to choose between his pride and your protection. And what did he do? He chose you. He burned Julian. He crushed Margaret. He demonstrated that he could manipulate the New York market with his hands tied behind his back."
Genevieve stood up. She was tall, commanding, her ivory silhouette dominating the sterile luxury of the room. She walked toward Ethan until she was standing less than two feet away.
"You proved your worth, Ethan," she said softly, almost tenderly, raising a gloved hand toward his cheek. "You cleared the boardroom. You reclaimed Sterling Capital. Now, you will sign the Cantonal Covenant. You will merge Sterling with the Montague Trust, take your seat in Zurich, and Olivia will be provided with a generous five-hundred-million-dollar divorce settlement."
Ethan didn't flinch. He didn't move away from her hand, but the ice in his eyes froze the air between them.
"And if I refuse?"
Genevieve’s smile did not waver, but her eyes turned black as an open grave.
"Then your father dies in five minutes when I instruct the clinic to withdraw his life support. And by four o'clock this afternoon, Olivia’s mother will be arrested in Manhattan for financial fraud on warrants I bought ten years ago. You don't have a choice, my son. You are a Montague. You belong to the syndicate."
May you like
From the bed, Richard’s monitor suddenly flatlined with a piercing, continuous electronic shriek.
***
