Sylvie watched in heartbreak as Tavish’s fiancée Benedetta ripped a photograph of the toddler’s missing mother from an album, dropped it into a fountain, and cruelly whispered that it was just another secret and another piece of her mother.

Tavish did not raise his voice. He took a single step forward, closing the distance until his shadow fell completely over Benedetta. He reached out with his left hand, his fingers clamping around Julian’s throat and slamming the older brother against the wall with enough force to crack the plaster behind the silk wallpaper.

Julian gasped, his hands clawing at Tavish’s iron wrist, his eyes bulging as his feet lifted two inches from the floor.

"Julian has thirty seconds of oxygen," Tavish said, looking directly into Benedetta’s widening eyes. "Where is my wife?"

"Tavish! Stop! You’re killing him!" Benedetta shrieked, clawing at his dark suit jacket. "Stop it! I’ll talk! I’ll talk!"

Tavish didn't loosen his grip. "Twenty seconds."

"She’s at the Blackwood Sanatorium in Maine!" Benedetta wailed, tears streaming down her powdered cheeks, ruining her mascara. "She’s under an alias! Sarah Vance! We checked her in as Julian’s sister six months ago!"

Tavish dropped Julian. The man collapsed onto the floorboards, coughing violently, sucking in ragged breaths of air while clutching his bruised windpipe.

"Why?" Tavish asked, looking down at them both. "Clara had no interest in the shipping lanes. She never touched the books."

"She found the journals, you idiot!" Julian wheezed from the floor, his voice raw and broken. "Your mother kept records! For forty years, your mother tracked every bribe, every payoff, every offshore account your father set up with our father! She kept the original ledger in that metal closet in her bedroom!"

Benedetta wiped her face, her eyes burning with venom. "Your mother was going to hand those books over to the Department of Justice before she died. She wanted out. She wanted you out of the life. She knew what you were becoming, Tavish! She hated what you were!"

"My mother loved me," Tavish said, the words quiet, cold, and final.

"Then why did she lock the ledger away?" Benedetta challenged, stepping closer, her voice rising in shrill desperation. "She hid the key with Clara! When your mother died, Clara went into that room and took the duplicate key. Clara knew that if those books went public, the Vance family and the Rookfield empire would both be torn down by the federal government!"

"So you poisoned my mother," Tavish said.

Benedetta flinched. The corridor went dead quiet.

"We gave her what she asked for," Julian rasped, struggling to his knees. "She was eighty-one years old, Tavish. Her heart was failing anyway. We just... accelerated the process before she could meet with the federal prosecutor."

"And Clara?" Tavish asked.

"Clara was too smart," Benedetta said, a bitter sneer returning to her lips. "She figured out the medication discrepancies within two weeks of the funeral. She threatened to go to the police. So we gave her a choice: check herself into Blackwood quietly, or we would make sure Sylvie had an unfortunate fall down the grand staircase."

Tavish stood motionless. For five seconds, the only sound was the hum of the ventilation and Julian’s labored wheezing.

Then, Tavish reached into his inner jacket pocket and pulled out his encrypted satellite phone. He dialed a two-digit code and pressed the speaker button.

"Vance terminal," a rough voice answered from the receiver.

"Captain," Tavish spoke clearly. "Burn the southern docks."

"Tavish, no!" Julian screamed, lunging forward on his hands and knees. "That’s fifty million dollars of bonded inventory!"

"Burn the warehouses. Sink the two container ships docked at Pier 4," Tavish commanded into the phone. "And if anyone bearing the Vance name attempts to board a vessel, shoot them where they stand."

"Copy that, Mr. Rookfield. Executing now."