Chapter 4
Hadrian’s chest heaved in frantic, shallow gasps. He pulled against the zip-ties binding his wrists to the back of the mahogany chair, the plastic biting deep into his flesh, drawing thin ribbons of blood.
"You're an animal, Florian," Hadrian spat, terror stripping away his aristocratic polish. "You think you can intimidate everyone like you're still running the docks! My family has been in this state for two hundred years! We have judges on the Supreme Court! You touch me, and you spend the rest of your pathetic life in a federal penitentiary!"
Florian didn't answer. He picked up the knife.
He didn't touch Hadrian’s ear. Instead, with a motion so fast Hadrian didn't even see it begin, Florian drove the tip of the steel blade through the meat of Hadrian’s left thigh, pinning his trousers to the upholstery beneath.
Hadrian’s scream was muffled instantly by Vane’s gloved hand clamping down over his mouth, smothering the sound into a choked, wet gurgle. Hadrian’s legs kicked wildly, his eyes rolling back in sheer agony.
Florian leaned in, his face inches from Hadrian’s sweat-soaked brow.
"Forty seconds," Florian whispered. "Your two-hundred-year-old family owes twenty-four million dollars to the loan sharks in North Jersey. I know because I bought their notes three months ago. You don't own this house, Hadrian. You don't own the clothes on your back. And the judges on your Supreme Court take campaign donations from my offshore shell corporations. You have nothing. Now, where is Clara?"
Vane eased his hand back from Hadrian’s mouth, just enough to let him speak.
Hadrian sobbed, tears cutting lines through the blood on his cheeks. "She’s... she’s at Pine Ridge! The private sanitarium in the Berkshires!"
Florian’s eyes narrowed. "Pine Ridge is an addiction and psychiatric facility for the ultra-wealthy. Clara doesn't have an addiction. She doesn't have a psychiatric disorder."
"My mother arranged it!" Hadrian wept, his resistance crumbling like burnt paper. "Mother found the doctors! Dr. Lindt—he signed the commitment papers! He said Clara was suffering from acute paranoid psychosis and posed a danger to Tilda! We needed her declared incompetent so I could sign the trust transfer!"
"Why did Tilda say Mommy needed paint?" Florian asked, his voice deadly calm, twisting the blade half an inch.
Hadrian shrieked through his clenched teeth. "Because she fought back! When the orderlies came to the lake house two weeks ago, Clara fought them with a fireplace poker! They had to restrain her! She had bruises all over her face and arms! Mother couldn't let anyone see her like that when the transport van came through the gates, so she... she used the foundation paint to cover the marks!"
Florian pulled the blade from Hadrian’s leg. He wiped the steel clean on Hadrian’s silk tie, folded the knife, and slipped it back into his pocket.
"What drugs did Lindt give her?" Florian asked.
"Thorazine... heavy sedatives... I don't know the dosages! Mother handled the medical director! They’ve been keeping her under for twelve days!"
Florian stood up. He smoothed the lapels of his waistcoat, not looking back at the sobbing man on the floor.
"Vane," Florian said.
"Sir."
"Leave him here. Take his phone. Cut the landlines. If he bleeds to death on the carpet, send a cleaning crew in the morning."
May you like
"And the mother, Boss?"
Florian paused at the library door. His eyes were cold, ancient, and merciless. "Let’s go down to the cellar. I want to hear how emerald silk sounds when it tears."
