Chapter 9
Godwin didn't drop the phone. He reached down, scooped Lottie back into his left arm, and walked with measured, unhurried strides toward the northern wall of the ballroom.
"Kane," Godwin said into his radio. "Disengage the north storm shutters. Three feet only."
The heavy steel gears groaned as the center shutter on the northern terrace lifted thirty-six inches, letting in the cool, late-afternoon daylight.
Beyond the bulletproof glass, the private harbor of the Alderbrook estate stretched toward the gray chop of Long Island Sound. But docked at the deep-water pier, half a mile out, was not the private fishing yacht Godwin usually kept there.
A sleek, hundred-foot black motor yacht was idling at the slip, its twin turbine engines rumbling with a low, vibrating hum that traveled through the bedrock of the mansion. Flying from its radar mast was the Alderbrook family pennant—a gold falcon on a field of navy blue.
On the upper bridge deck, standing beside the railing with a set of marine binoculars in his hand, stood a man in a camel-hair overcoat.
Julian Alderbrook. Forty-six years old. Godwin’s younger brother.
"You like the vessel, Godwin?" Julian’s voice purred through the satellite phone. "Bought with the insurance payout from my own tragic death in Zurich. It turns out the maritime registries are remarkably flexible when you have three corrupt Swiss trustees on your payroll."
"You brought a ship into my cove, Julian," Godwin said, watching the figure on the deck through the glass. "You know the harbor battery has four anti-ship torpedo tubes built into the seawall."
"I do know that," Julian chuckled. "Because I helped our father install them in nineteen-ninety-two. But you won't fire them, Godwin. Do you know why?"
Godwin didn't answer. His fingers tightened around Lottie’s small hip, feeling her breathe against his chest.
"Because Dr. Sterling’s private ambulance was intercepted three minutes after it left your front gate," Julian said, his voice dropping into a mocking, predatory whisper. "Clara isn't at Saint Jude’s Hospital, Godwin. She’s in the medical bay on the lower deck of this yacht. Right beside my private physician."
Lottie gasped, her head whipping toward the phone in Godwin’s hand. "Mommy? Is Mommy on the boat?"
"Hello, little Lottie," Julian’s voice drifted through the speaker, sweet as poisoned honey. "Your mother is sleeping very comfortably. But her heart rate is dropping. If my doctor doesn't administer the second dose of the neutralizing serum within fifteen minutes... she won't wake up for breakfast."
Godwin’s steel-gray eyes burned into the black hull in the harbor. "What do you want, Julian?"
"The master ledgers, Godwin," Julian said, the mockery evaporating into raw, ruthless ambition. "The bearer bonds in the library vault. And the signed transfer for Terminal Four. Bring them to the end of the pier yourself. Alone. No guards. No sidearms."
"And the girl?" Godwin asked.
May you like
"Bring Lottie with you," Julian said. "She can watch her mother wake up. Or she can watch her mother go under the water. The choice is yours, brother. You have twelve minutes before the tide turns."
The line clicked off.
