Chapter 3 - The Siege of Blackwood Manor
The speedometer needle trembled at one hundred and fifteen miles per hour as we rocketed down the M4 motorway, wipers slashing futilely against the blinding curtain of black rain. Lightning fractured the sky, turning the flooded highway into a ribbon of white bone.
In the passenger seat, I racked the slide of an estate-registered semi-automatic pistol, my hands steady despite the tempest raging inside my chest.
*11:39 PM.*
Twenty-one minutes remaining.
"Marcus," I said over the roar of the engine and the thunderous drumming of water against the roof. "Who was Vivien talking about when she said 'her bloodline'? Vance muttered something about her being more than just an opportunistic socialite."
Marcus swerved violently around a jackknifed articulated lorry, the armored SUV sliding momentarily before the all-wheel drive bit into the asphalt with a savage growl.
"While you were setting the trap at the Grosvenor, my tech team ran her biometric scans against Interpol’s red notices," Marcus replied, his jaw set like concrete. "Vivien Vance isn't her real name. Dr. Julian Vance isn't just her crooked physician. He’s her biological uncle."
My blood ran cold. "Her uncle?"
"Her real name is Vivien Sterling," Marcus spat. "Daughter of Arthur Sterling. The hedge-fund titan your father bankrupted twenty-five years ago after Sterling attempted a hostile, fraudulent takeover of the Blackwood shipping lines. Sterling shot himself in his cell at Belmarsh. Vivien was five years old."
The puzzle pieces fell into place with sickening clarity. This was never just about a ninety-million-pound estate. It was an ancestral vendetta. Vivien hadn't just seduced me for wealth; she had spent two decades engineering her way into our bedchambers to systematically dismantle my family, paralyze my mother, drive me to despair, and claim our lineage as her prize.
"She didn't just want the money," I whispered, the rage burning a hole through my gut. "She wanted us to suffer the way her father suffered."
"Sir, we’re approaching the manor gates," Marcus warned, killing the headlights.
Through the tree-lined gloom of the ancient estate, the jagged wrought-iron silhouettes of Blackwood Manor rose against the stormy sky like the ribs of an ancient leviathan. The main entrance was chained shut, but Marcus didn't brake.
"Hold on!" he yelled.
The armored front bumper of the Sentinel smashed through the iron gates with a deafening screech of ripping metal and shattered hinges. The vehicle surged up the winding gravel driveway, branches whipping across the windshield like skeletal fingers.
Instead of heading toward the manor's grand portico, Marcus swung the steering wheel hard to the left, cutting across the manicured lawns toward the dark, rushing waters of the River Thames that bordered the southern boundary of the estate.
The Victorian boathouse stood on rotting wooden pilings, half-submerged in the swirling, black current. The tidal waters were already rising, lapping aggressively against the rotten timber siding.
A lone, rusted Land Rover Defender was parked under the willow trees, its running lights amber in the fog.
*11:52 PM.*
Eight minutes.
"Two hostiles outside," Marcus whispered, drawing his sidearm and equipping a suppressor with practiced speed. "Private mercenaries. Vivien spared no expense."
"They don't leave this property alive if that child is harmed," I said, my voice dead, devoid of humanity.
We breached the doors of the Sentinel simultaneously.
The storm swallowed the sound of our boots in the mud. The two guards, wrapped in heavy oilskin coats, were standing under the boathouse awning, smoking cigarettes, their eyes fixed on the rising water level.
"Time's almost up," one of them said in a thick Eastern European accent, tossing his cigarette into the river. "The boss didn't call. Hit the release on the sluice and let's go."
Marcus didn't give them the chance.
Two suppressed cracks hissed through the wind. The first mercenary collapsed into the mud without a sound. The second spun, reaching for a submachine gun slung across his chest, but I was already upon him.
I slammed my body weight into his ribs, driving him against the boathouse wall. I drove my pistol barrel under his chin, pinning his skull against the wood.
"The key!" I roared into his face over the deafening roar of the rising tide. "Where is the key to the trunk?!"
"Inside... hanging by the winch!" the man choked out, terrified by the feral madness in my eyes. "The mechanism is already running! You can't stop the motor!"
Marcus struck him with the butt of his weapon, dropping him unconscious into the reeds.
I kicked the rotting boathouse door inward.
The smell of stagnant water, motor oil, and iron hit me instantly. Inside, the river was roaring through the open floorboards. The automated sluice gate—a massive iron grate controlled by a rusted industrial winch—was grinding downward, allowing the raging river to funnel into the chamber like a cataract.
In the center of the flooded dock, half-submerged in two feet of surging, icy water, was a heavy steel industrial lockbox.
Chained to its handle was a child's pink woolen mitten.
From inside the steel box came a tiny, muffled, desperate wail: *"Mama? Mama, it's cold! Mama!"*
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"Marcus! The chains!" I screamed, diving headfirst into the freezing black water.
***