THE DISCARDED SON-IN-LAWS GOD-LEVEL DOMINION SYSTEM

Chapter 14

The hospital waiting room smelled of antiseptic and weak tea.

Vanessa sat on a plastic chair with a thick white bandage across her forehead. A nurse had cleaned the cut and checked her ribs. Nothing was broken. Her coat had been taken away and replaced by a thin blue blanket. She held a paper cup in both hands and stared at the floor.

Ethan stood by the window with his arms folded. He had been standing there for forty minutes. The police had taken his statement and left. Two officers waited in the corridor now, their eyes polite and careful. Word had already spread. The man who had taken over Whitmore Group had defeated twelve armed men with his bare hands. A nurse at the front desk had whispered it to another nurse and both of them had looked at him as if he were an actor on television.

"You should go," Vanessa said quietly. "You have things to do."

"I do."

"But you are still here."

He did not answer. He watched the lights of the parking lot through the glass.

The elevator at the end of the hall opened with a loud ding. Heavy footsteps rushed toward them. A man's voice shouted, "Vanessa!"

Victor Whitmore ran into the waiting room. His blue suit was wrinkled and his tie hung loose. His hair stuck out in all directions. When he saw her he stopped, and relief and rage crossed his face at the same time.

"They called me from the police. What happened? Who did this?"

"I am fine, Victor," Vanessa said.

"You are not fine! You have a bandage on your head!" He turned and saw Ethan by the window. His face went dark. "You."

Ethan said nothing.

"This is your fault." Victor strode toward him with his fists clenched. "You put her in danger. You took everything from us and now thugs are chasing my sister down a dark road. You will pay for this. I swear, I will..."

"Victor, stop." Vanessa stood. Her voice was sharp and clear. "He saved my life."

Victor froze. "What?"

"Twelve men ran my car off the road. They were going to push me into the river. Ethan came and stopped them." She swallowed. "They were Damien's men. Damien arranged it."

Victor stared at her. His mouth opened, then closed. His hands slowly loosened at his sides.

"That is not possible," he said. "Damien would never..."

"He sent ten men to kill Ethan in a hotel room last night," Ethan said calmly. "Three nights ago, he sent three more in the rain. Tonight he sent twelve to take your sister. Every time he has failed. Every time he has become more desperate."

"You are lying."

"The police have the cameras. The hotel footage. The road cameras. The men are in custody and will talk." Ethan turned from the window. "Ask them yourself."

Victor looked at his sister's bandaged face. He looked at the two officers in the corridor. For the first time since Ethan had known him, Victor Whitmore had nothing to say.

"Damien used you," Ethan continued. "He used your family and your name to reach a place he did not belong. When it failed, he decided to burn everything down on his way out. You and Vanessa are only tools to him. You were always tools."

Victor sank slowly into a chair. He put his face in his hands. His shoulders shook once. When he lifted his head, his eyes were red and he looked ten years older.

"My father needs to know," he whispered.

"Your father already knows more than he says," Ethan said.

Victor looked up sharply. "What does that mean?"

"Ask him about the Cross family."

The color left Victor's face. "I do not understand."

"I think you do not. That is why I am telling you to ask."

He picked up his coat from the back of a chair. Vanessa watched him with wide eyes. "Where are you going?"

"Home. I have work tonight."

"Ethan." She stepped forward. Her hand reached for his sleeve and stopped an inch short. "Thank you. For coming. For everything."

He looked at her hand hanging in the air. Then he looked at her face. The pride was gone from it. The cold was gone too. What was left was something small and tired and honest. He did not hate her. That was the strange thing. He had expected hate to remain. Instead there was only a flat, quiet emptiness where the old pain used to be.

"Go home, Vanessa," he said. "Stay with your brother. Do not drive alone for a while."

He walked out of the waiting room and did not look back.

In the parking lot, Daniel opened the car door for him and bowed. "Mr. Cross. Mrs. Tan is waiting at the office. She said it was urgent."

"At this hour?"

"She said the files you asked for contain something you will want to see tonight."

Ethan slid into the back seat. As the car rolled out into the quiet street, the System opened a soft blue window.

[Black Tiger intelligence file: Unlocked.]

[Target: Rao Hu, known as Black Tiger.]

[Age: 46.]

[Base of operations: Harbor Nine Casino.]

[Strength: 200 armed men. Control of the east docks, three shipping warehouses, and a smuggling route.]

[Weakness: Debts. Black Tiger owes 140 million dollars to six lenders and has hidden this from his own men.]

Ethan read the last line twice. A cold smile appeared on his face. Debts. Always debts. Men who ruled by fear hid their weakness in numbers.

[Mission: Crush the Black Tiger Gang within seventy-two hours.]

[Reward: Underworld Dominion Token.]

[Failure: Loss of one System function.]

He closed the window. The car turned onto the empty avenue.

When they reached Whitmore Group, the building stood dark except for the light on the top floor. Ethan rode the elevator up alone. The hallway was silent. Mrs. Tan was waiting at the door of the chairman's office with a pot of tea and four thick boxes on the table behind her. Her gray hair had begun to come loose from its knot. She looked as if she had not slept.

"Mr. Cross." She bowed her head slightly. "I hope you will forgive the hour."

"Show me."

She led him to the desk and opened the first box. Inside were stacks of old ledgers, stamped and tied with string. She pulled one out and flipped it open to a page marked with a yellow paper clip.

"Ten years ago, in the autumn," she said in a low voice, "the Whitmore Group paid a very large sum from the chairman's private account. Thirty million dollars. It went to a company that no longer exists. A company called Dragonfly Trading. There is no record of any goods bought or sold. No contract. No invoice. Only the payment."

Ethan ran his eyes down the page. The date was circled in red ink. October ninth.

His fingers tightened on the paper.

"What day did the Cross family fire happen?" he asked quietly.

Mrs. Tan's face did not change, but her hands trembled slightly. "I was only a junior clerk then, Mr. Cross. But I remember the date. It was the night of October eighth."

The room felt very still.

"Whoever paid for the fire," Ethan said, "paid for it the next morning."

"I do not know that for certain." Mrs. Tan pressed her lips together. "But I have kept this book hidden for ten years, sir. I always thought it was wrong. I never had the courage to say so."

Ethan closed the ledger and set it down gently, as if it might break.

"You were afraid," he said.

"Yes."

"You are not afraid now."

"I am very afraid," Mrs. Tan said. "But you remind me of someone I once worked for. A man who treated clerks like people. I do not remember his face. Only that he laughed easily and learned everyone's name."

She looked at the jade pendant that had slipped out of his collar again. Her eyes went wide, then soft with a kind of sad understanding.

"You have his eyes," she whispered.

Ethan stood quietly for a long time. The city glowed in the window behind him. He picked up the ledger and held it against his chest.

"Thank you, Mrs. Tan," he said. "You have done something brave tonight. I will not forget it."

She bowed deeply and wiped her cheek with the back of her hand.

When she had gone, Ethan sat in the chairman's chair and opened the book again. The red circle around the date seemed to glow.

October eighth. October ninth. One night of fire. One morning of payment.

Somewhere in the numbers was the name of the man who had burned his family, and Ethan was going to find it.