Chapter 7 - The Inheritance of Blood
"Tell me," Valerie demanded, her voice trembling slightly for the first time all day. "Tell me what happened six years ago."
Brennan shifted slightly, wincing as his ribs pulled against the heavy bandages, but his gray eyes never left hers.
"Six years ago, my father—Arthur Vance—was losing a war against the Syndicate Council," Brennan explained, each word measured and precise. "He needed forty million dollars in un-traceable liquid capital to buy political protection and heavy armaments. He couldn't take it from our official accounts without alerting the feds."
Valerie’s chest tightened. "So he stole it from his own firm's clients."
"He used your father's administrative credentials to execute the transfers," Brennan said flatly. "Raymond was the chief accountant. He was meticulous, honorable, and trusted my father completely. When Raymond realized forty million had disappeared into shell accounts in the Caymans, he didn't run. He took the ledger to my father, thinking it was a system breach."
Valerie closed her eyes, a sharp, bitter wave of grief washing over her heart. "And your father framed him."
"My father had him arrested that night," Brennan confirmed softly. "He planted the offshore access keys in Raymond's home office. He made your father the scapegoat to save the family empire."
"And the suicide?" Valerie asked, opening her eyes, her gaze burning into his like liquid iron. "Did your father kill him in that cell?"
Brennan paused, his jaw tightening. "My father ordered the hit. But it wasn't carried out by a Vance loyalist. The captain who executed the order... was Don Marco. The same man who put a bullet in my side twelve hours ago."
Valerie felt the floor beneath her feet seem to slip away.
For five years she had lived with the shame of her father's disgrace, the humiliation forced upon her by Aunt Gretchen and Crawford, the endless nights of wondering if her father had broken under the weight of guilt. He hadn't broken. He had been murdered by the very empire Brennan now ruled.
"Why are you telling me this?" Valerie rasped, her hands clenched into white-knuckled fists at her sides. "I could leave you here to rot. I could call Marco's men right now."
"You could," Brennan agreed calmly, making no move to defend himself. "You have every right to kill me, Valerie. My family ruined your life. But if you call Marco, he will kill you the second he finds out who your father was. You are the last loose thread of that forty-million-dollar theft."
He reached into his back pocket, pulling out a small, blood-stained micro-drive he had kept concealed throughout the chaos. He held it out to her.
May you like
"What is that?" she asked.
"The master decryption keys to the Cayman accounts," Brennan said. "My father died two years ago, but I kept the drive. I was waiting for the right moment to destroy Marco and clear your father's name. That's why Marco tried to assassinate me last night. He found out I had the proof."
