No Fortune Can Buy His Mercy

Chapter 008

Dexter Hayes had barely stepped off the elevator when Dr. Victor Finch scurried over to report. His voice was low and eager to please as he informed Dexter that Elias Vance had already called in a surgeon to operate on Elena Croft.

"Are you kidding me?" Dexter's face twisted with fury. "I already put the word out. Who the hell has a death wish big enough to operate on that woman?"

Leo Croft clenched his jaw and started forward, every muscle in his body coiled to fight, but Elias raised a hand and stopped him without a word.

Dexter's gaze locked onto Elias, cold and contemptuous. "So you're the one giving me trouble? Insisting on getting her into surgery?"

"That's me." Elias stepped forward, his tone utterly flat. "And you're Dexter Hayes?"

Dexter looked him up and down with open disdain, then let out a short, mocking laugh. "Who the hell are you supposed to be? Willing to cross me just to save Elena Croft. What, are you sleeping with her?" He snorted and shook his head, lip curling with disgust. "You don't even look like much."

The temperature behind Elias's eyes dropped several degrees, but Dexter kept going, riding his own arrogance like a wave. "You've got three minutes to drag Elena out of that operating room and get out of my sight. Otherwise, I'll break both your legs so you can keep her company in a wheelchair."

"Dexter, this is insane!" Leo couldn't hold back any longer. "What did she ever do to you? She turned you down, that's it! And you want to cripple her for the rest of her life? What kind of sick bastard are you?"

Dexter's eyes drifted lazily toward Leo. "Who's the little punk running his mouth?" Recognition flickered across his face. "Oh, it's you. Get lost before I put you in the ground."

The young nurse from earlier had retreated into the far corner of the hallway, pressing herself against the wall. She was trembling so badly she could barely breathe, her mind racing with a single thought: they're dead, they're all dead. Dexter is back and these fools picked a fight with him. There's no surviving this.

Whispered conversations rippled among the staff who had gathered at a safe distance. "Of all people to cross, they had to pick Dexter Hayes." "The guy's a rabid dog. He bites down and doesn't let go, and his family has the connections to make it stick." "They'll be carried out of here on stretchers. Or worse."

Doctors and nurses exchanged grim glances. Not a single one of them liked Dexter Hayes, but not a single one dared to intervene.

"You think you can show off in front of me?" Dexter roared, his voice bouncing off the corridor walls. "Get them! Break this bastard's legs and throw him out!"

Elias merely lifted a finger. Gideon stepped forward in one fluid motion, planting himself in the corridor like a mountain that had suddenly risen from the earth.

The dozen thugs Dexter had brought surged forward in a pack, wielding batons and pipes, aiming for Gideon's legs. Leo tensed to charge in after them, but Elias caught him by the shoulder and pressed him back, then glanced at Maya Brooks. "He's not thinking straight. Keep hold of him. I don't want him getting hurt."

Gideon exploded forward into the mass of bodies. For a man built like a siege engine, he moved with startling fluidity, weaving between strikes like a serpent threading through tall grass. His right fist lashed out in precise, devastating arcs.

Every punch dropped a man.

There was no wasted motion, no theatrical flourish. Each blow landed with surgical certainty, and each was followed by a scream and the heavy thud of a body hitting the floor. The attackers couldn't so much as graze the hem of his jacket.

The whole thing took twenty seconds, maybe less. When Gideon finished, not one of Dexter's men remained standing. They writhed and groaned across the linoleum, clutching broken ribs and shattered joints. A few had simply gone limp, unconscious before they hit the ground.

Gideon turned his cold gaze on Dr. Victor Finch, who was pressed flat against the wall. "No medical ethics, and you're happy playing lapdog to a thug like this. What's the point of you being alive?"

Victor Finch went white as paper. His knees buckled and he scrambled backward on all fours, desperate to disappear before anyone decided to settle accounts with him.

Dexter stood frozen, mouth hanging open. He had never in his life seen someone fight like that. His entire crew, wiped out in the span of a few heartbeats. The sheer, efficient brutality of it left his mind blank.

Then the shock curdled into rage. "You just hit my people!" he screamed, his voice cracking. "Do you have any idea what you've done? You've just brought hell down on yourselves!"

Elias's voice was calm, almost bored. "Kneel when you speak to me."

Dexter blinked, and for a moment he seemed to think he'd misheard. "What did you just say? Kneel? Who the hell do you think you are? You got the guts to give me your name?"

"My name is Elias Vance."

"Vance?" Dexter's eyes widened a fraction.

Leo's heart seized and he lunged forward before he could stop himself. "No, you heard wrong! His name is Elias Lance, not Vance!"

Dexter's momentary surprise melted into a sneer. "Right. That's what I figured. The Vance line died out years ago. No one with that name would dare act this bold in Cresthaven."

"You heard correctly." Elias stood with his hands clasped behind his back, utterly at ease. "My name is Vance."

Leo grabbed his arm, panicked. "What are you doing?"

"A real man bows to no one." Elias's gaze didn't waver. "My brother gave me this name. I won't discard it because some rabid little dog tries to bare his teeth at me."

Leo's stomach dropped as the full weight of the admission settled over him. If the Sterling family learned the connection between Elias and Arthur Vance, Elias wouldn't make it out of Cresthaven alive. He wouldn't even have a place to be buried.

"You're dead!" Dexter snarled, saliva spraying from his lips. "God himself couldn't save you now. You dare talk to me like that, and you dare insult me?"

"Marshal Vance told you to kneel."

Gideon snatched two metal serving trays from the nurses' station and hurled them in a single, vicious motion. They spun through the air and cracked against the backs of Dexter's knees with a sound like a gunshot. Dexter let out a shriek as his legs buckled, and he crashed to his knees on the hard floor. The impact sent twin shockwaves of pain up his spine, and he doubled over, cursing through gritted teeth.

Gideon returned to Elias's side without a word, hands clasped behind his back, expression carved from stone.

Leo stared at the scene before him, caught between awe and terror. A moment ago he'd been ready to throw punches alongside them, but watching Dexter Hayes forced to his knees before Elias, real fear began to creep in.

"You need to leave Cresthaven," Leo urged. "Right now."

"He's not going anywhere." Dexter's face split into a savage grin despite the blood draining from his cheeks, and he fumbled a phone from his pocket. "I'm calling my sister. You're finished."

Leo lunged and snatched the phone from his hand, but Elias simply walked over, took it from Leo, and tossed it back at Dexter's feet. His voice was ice. "Go ahead. Call her."

Leo stamped his foot in frustration. "This isn't how things used to be! You're being reckless!"

Dexter dialed with shaking, furious fingers. The moment the line connected, he was already shouting. "Veronica, I got jumped! Get over here, now!"

"What happened? Where are you?" a woman's voice demanded.

Before Dexter could answer, Elias plucked the phone from his grasp with a casual motion and spoke into it without inflection. "Aegis Medical Center. Come collect your brother's body."

Then his hand closed, and the phone shattered into fragments that scattered across the floor.

"You son of a bitch!" Dexter seethed, his eyes burning with venomous hatred. "You made me kneel. I'll make sure you spend the rest of your life on your knees!"

Leo was beside himself with worry, but Maya Brooks had steadied. She placed a hand on Leo's arm. "If Elias has a plan, let him handle it. Watch and see."

"You don't understand," Leo said in a strained whisper. "Dexter's family has serious connections. They have a direct line to the Sterling family. If they find out who Elias really is, the trouble that comes won't just be serious. It'll be fatal."

Dexter was already trying to push himself to his feet, blood smeared across his chin, that deranged smile spreading wider. "My sister's on her way with a full crew. Let's see if you're still this cocky when she arrives. I swear to—"

"Stay down." Elias frowned, and his foot pressed lightly against Dexter's kneecap.

Dexter's legs gave out instantly, and he slammed back to his knees with a sickening crack against the floor tiles. He howled, clutching his legs, tears of pain streaming down his face.

"This guy is insane," one of the doctors whispered from behind a doorframe. "He's actually going toe-to-toe with Dexter Hayes."

"Satisfying as hell to watch," another murmured, "but I'd start writing his eulogy. He won't last the week."

"He should've walked away the second Dexter showed up. Apologized, abandoned Elena, and gotten out clean."

The orthopedic staff exchanged dark looks. Not one of them had dared accept Elena's surgery, because when Dexter Hayes gave an order in this hospital, disobedience was not an option.

"I'll kill you!" Dexter screamed from the floor, spitting blood. "I'll f—"

The crack of leather on flesh cut him off. Elias had produced a pair of calfskin gloves from his coat pocket and whipped them across Dexter's mouth with cold, measured precision.

"Make sense," he said.

"F— you!" Dexter shrieked, blood bubbling between his teeth.

The glove struck again, harder, snapping Dexter's head sideways. Blood sprayed from his split lips in a fine mist.

"Go to h—"

A third blow landed with ruthless accuracy, sending two teeth skittering across the linoleum. Dexter's eyes rolled, his vision swimming, but the profanity was still trying to claw its way out of his throat.

"Make sense." Elias looked down at him, expression unchanged, as though he were correcting a misbehaving child rather than beating a man bloody.

"I was wrong." The words tumbled out of Dexter immediately, all defiance collapsing at once.

Elias allowed himself a cold smile. He pulled a tissue from his pocket and cleaned the blood from his gloves with unhurried precision.

Dexter's mind was already racing behind his swelling eyes. Take the hit now, survive, and settle this later. He could swallow his pride for five minutes if it meant walking out of here alive.

Leo drew a sharp breath and pulled Elias aside. But even as he did, he caught sight of Dexter staring at Elias from the floor. The smile spreading across Dexter's bloodied face was something inhuman, a promise of retribution so absolute it made Leo's skin crawl.

Elias glanced back at Leo and spoke as casually as if offering advice about the weather. "When someone refuses to make sense, you just slap them until they do. It's not complicated."

Dexter said nothing, seething in silence on the floor.

Then the sound of rapid footsteps echoed from the stairwell, followed by a woman's voice, sharp and commanding. "Who touched my brother?"

Veronica Hayes burst onto the floor, breathless and furious, flanked by a squad of bodyguards whose presence filled the corridor with immediate menace.

Dexter's battered face lit up with savage joy. "Veronica! Over here!" He craned his neck to look up at Elias, blood and triumph mixing in his grin. "There she is. Let's see you act tough now. I'll f—"

The glove cracked across his mouth one final time.