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

Chapter 16

Damien Kane had been drinking for three days.

The motel room on the edge of the city was small and gray. The curtains were closed. Empty bottles lay on the floor, on the bed, on the cracked television stand. The air smelled sour. The man who once wore a gray suit and a smile like a knife now sat on the bathroom floor in a stained shirt, with his back against the tub and a bottle in his hand.

His phone lay beside him. It had stopped ringing two days ago. At first it had rung all the time. Banks. Lawyers. Old friends. Then reporters. Then no one.

The last message was from his mother. Four words. We are very sorry.

He looked at it for a long time. Then he threw the phone across the room. It hit the wall and cracked.

"Useless," Damien said. His voice was hoarse. "Everyone is useless. Everyone."

He drank from the bottle and wiped his mouth. His eyes were red. His hair was greasy. A week ago, he had sat on top of the world and laughed at a man in a cheap suit. Now he could not afford the room.

A soft knock came at the door.

Damien stiffened. He did not move. The knock came again, three slow taps.

"Go away," he called.

"Room service," a voice said from the other side. It was calm and quiet. It was not a motel employee's voice.

Damien's blood went cold. He knew that voice.

"No," he whispered. "No, no, no."

He scrambled up from the floor. His legs were weak. He staggered to the window and pulled the curtain aside a finger's width. A black car sat in the parking lot with its engine running. A young man in a dark suit stood beside it. Behind it, two police cars waited with their lights off.

He turned toward the door. His hands shook so hard that he dropped the bottle. It broke on the floor.

The door opened.

It was not forced. It was not kicked in. It simply opened, as if the lock had never existed. A tall man in a black suit stepped inside, closed it behind him, and stood in the dim light.

"Hello, Damien."

Damien backed up until his legs hit the bed and he fell onto it. "How did you find me?"

"You used your mother's credit card to pay for the room." Ethan looked around slowly at the empty bottles and the stained walls. His face showed no pleasure. "Her bank called me this morning. I own the bank."

Damien stared at him. His mouth worked, but no words came.

"I came to tell you three things," Ethan said. He walked to the small table by the window and pulled out the single chair. He sat down calmly, with his hands resting on his knees. "First. Black Tiger is finished. His men work for me now. Everything you paid him went to a debt he never paid back. You were robbed twice."

Damien's face twisted. "He took my money?"

"All of it. He had spent it before the call. Second." Ethan raised two fingers. "The police outside have everything. The hotel cameras. The river road. The men who attacked me. They all confessed. The only thing missing is your own statement."

"I will not give one."

"Third." Ethan lowered his hand. "Your father has not abandoned you completely. He called me last night."

Damien's head jerked up. "My father?"

"He asked me to spare your life."

Silence. The old air conditioner rattled in the corner.

Damien's lip trembled. "He... he called you?"

"He said he made a mistake. He said he was too hard on you. He said he wanted his son back, even a broken one." Ethan's voice stayed flat. "I told him I would think about it."

Tears began to run down Damien's face. He pressed his hands over his eyes. Great sobs shook his shoulders. He sat on the edge of the dirty bed, a man who had lost everything but a father's last bit of pity, and he cried like a child.

Ethan watched him without moving. He felt no triumph. He felt strangely tired.

"You punched me in the face in front of three hundred people," he said at last. "You laughed. You sent men to kill me three times. You tried to hurt a woman you claimed you wanted to marry. And still your father wants you back." He shook his head slowly. "You do not deserve him."

"I know," Damien choked out. "I know. I know. I know."

"Then do one thing right."

Damien looked up with wet red eyes.

"The police will take your statement," Ethan said. "You will tell them everything. The hotel. The river. The men you hired. Every name. You will tell the truth to a judge and you will serve whatever sentence he gives. If you do, I will ask the court to be fair. And your father will see you walk through the prison doors with your head up."

"I cannot..."

"You can." Ethan stood. "It is the only way you will ever be a man he can be proud of. You have until I count to ten."

Damien stared at the floor. His whole body shook. Seconds passed.

"One," Ethan said. "Two."

Damien wiped his face with both hands. His fingers left dark streaks on his cheeks.

"Three. Four. Five."

"Wait."

"Six."

"I will do it." The words burst out in a ragged whisper. "I will do it. I will tell them everything."

Ethan stopped counting. He walked to the door and opened it. Two officers in dark uniforms waited in the hallway. They stepped inside quietly. One of them took Damien gently by the arm.

Damien stood. His legs shook. At the door he paused and turned back.

"Why?" he asked hoarsely. "Why are you giving me this chance? You could have killed me. Nobody would have stopped you."

Ethan looked at him for a long moment.

"Because I am not you," he said.

The officers led Damien out into the gray afternoon. His shoulders were bent, but he walked on his own feet. In the parking lot an elderly man in a gray coat stood next to a car. Old Mr. Kane. He did not speak. He only watched his son come down the steps. When Damien reached him, the old man put one hand on his shoulder and held it there.

Ethan watched from the doorway of the motel. Then he started across the parking lot toward his own car.

"Mr. Cross."

He stopped. Old Mr. Kane had left his son in the care of the officers and was walking toward him with slow, careful steps. The old man looked smaller than he had in the newspaper photo. His gray coat hung loose on his shoulders. His eyes were dark and tired and very clear.

"I have no right to ask you for anything," Old Mr. Kane said. "I raised a son who thought money was the same thing as strength. That failure is mine, not yours. Yet you could have destroyed him tonight, and you chose to give him a way back."

"I did it for myself," Ethan said. "Not for him."

"Perhaps." The old man bowed his head slightly. It was a small movement, but it was the bow of a proud man who rarely bowed at all. "Whatever your reason, the Kane family owes you a debt. When you need a favor, you will only have to say it."

Ethan studied him for a moment. "Then I will ask for one thing now. When the old families of this city speak of the Silver Pavilion, what do they say?"

Old Mr. Kane's face changed. The tiredness left it, and a deep, careful fear took its place. He glanced at the street, then at the sky, then back at Ethan.

"That it is a place for men who do not exist," he said quietly. "Do not go there alone, Mr. Cross. Not if you value your life."

He turned and walked back to his son without another word.

Ethan got into the car and closed the door.

The System opened gently in front of him.

[Mission complete: Destroy Damien Kane's remaining power.]

[Reward: Dominion Level 3.]

[New function unlocked: Intelligence Network.]

[New location available: The Silver Pavilion. Date of event: October thirty-first.]

Ethan sat in the back seat and watched the road. October thirty-first. Nine days from now.

His phone rang. The number was unknown. He almost ignored it. Then he answered.

"Mr. Cross," a woman's voice said. It was low and smooth and unhurried, with a soft accent he could not place. "You do not know me. But I knew your father."

The car went very quiet.

"Who is this?" Ethan said.

"A friend of the Cross family. One of the very few you still have." A soft pause. "Please be careful at the Silver Pavilion. The people who will be waiting for you there are far more dangerous than anyone you have faced so far. Come to the old teahouse on Willow Lane tomorrow at noon. Come alone. I will explain everything."

The line went dead.

Ethan lowered the phone slowly. Outside the window, the sun was setting over the city. The sky had turned deep gold.

He closed his hand around the jade dragon at his neck.

"My father," he said softly.

For ten years he had believed he was alone.