Chapter 487 The Madwoman Escapes, Gunshots Startle the Soul

Chapter 487 The Madwoman Escapes, Gunshots Startle the Soul

"The gift I've prepared for this world... very soon, you'll all receive it."

They acted like they'd received some kind of signal, all pulling out black stun batons from their clothes at the same time and jabbing them straight at Nicholas's security team.

The sound of electric current mixed with a few muffled groans, like pouring cold water into boiling oil—the whole place exploded into chaos.

Screams instantly drowned out everything else. Guests scrambled around like crazy, tables flipped over, expensive wine glasses smashed on the floor, shattering everywhere.

In the chaos, a middle-aged man in a three-piece suit appeared silently beside Candice. He didn't look like a bodyguard—his eyes were terrifyingly calm.

"Time to go."

He grabbed Candice's arm, giving her no chance to react, and dragged her toward a huge decorative oil painting on the side. Behind it was the secret passage she'd prepared long ago.

But just as the man's hand touched the mechanism, there was a muffled thud from inside the wall behind the painting.

The passage had been locked from the outside.

The man's expression changed for the first time.

"Fuck," he cursed under his breath.

Nicholas had anticipated every one of her escape routes.

"Grab her!" Nicholas's voice wasn't loud, but it cut through all the noise, reaching every security guard's ears clearly.

The men in black suits immediately closed in.

The man shielded Candice behind him. She stared at Sophia and Nicholas as they approached step by step, her eyes practically dripping with poison. She suddenly pulled a phone from her purse and moved to smash it on the ground without thinking.

It was the core backup of "Project Genesis."

A figure moved faster than security.

Graham, dressed in a server's uniform, moved like a cat, using overturned dining tables as cover, silently rushing out from the side. He didn't look at anyone—his eyes were only on that falling phone.

The instant Candice's wrist dropped, he grabbed it and twisted hard.

Candice screamed in pain, and the phone flew from her hand.

Graham caught the phone mid-air, his feet never stopping. He rolled backward in one motion and handed the phone to the nearest security captain, his movements so fast they left only an afterimage.

"You traitor!" Candice recognized Graham's face and shook with rage, pointing at his nose. "I raised you for twenty years! You dog!"

"Sophia!" Since she couldn't get the phone back, she aimed all her hatred at that woman. "You're trash! Gordon creating you was a mistake! You'll get everyone around you killed! Nicholas! And that daughter of yours! They'll all die because of you!"

Her words cut like knives.

Right then—

A gunshot—dull, but enough to silence the whole room.

All the screaming and chaos seemed to hit pause. A second later came even more frantic panic.

Nicholas's reaction was inhumanly fast. The same second the shot rang out, he'd already pulled Sophia completely into his arms, his back facing outward, shielding her completely.

"Team A! Highest alert! Protect Ms. Anderson and Olivia!"

"Big Cat! Lock down all signals and exits! Not even a fly gets out!"

His orders transmitted calmly through the micro earpiece.

Sophia poked her head out from under Nicholas's arm, her heart still pounding wildly, but her eyes cold. She quickly scanned the scene.

The person shot and down wasn't a guest, nor was it someone from the Martinez family.

It was a man in black tactical gear. He'd been approaching Candice from another direction, still holding a pistol with a silencer. Now, there was a bloody hole in his chest, blood pouring out.

The shooter was the man protecting Candice.

He'd shot the attacker dead with one bullet, didn't even look at the result, and immediately dragged Candice toward another backup exit, using the new wave of chaos as cover.

There was a third party!

Someone wanted to kill Candice right here to silence her!

"Interesting," Sophia said quietly.

Candice's people went crazy too, using their bodies to ram the Martinez family's security and those suddenly appearing men in black. The scene instantly turned bloody.

"Don't worry about me! Kill her! Kill Sophia!" Candice was still screaming frantically as she was dragged away.

In the end, after leaving behind several bodies, the man in the three-piece suit still managed to disappear with Candice through the fire exit door.

The chaotic scene gradually calmed under the Martinez Group security's strong control. Reporters were cleared out, guests were taken to lounges to be calmed down, and the injured were all sent away immediately.

Sophia pushed Nicholas away and walked quickly to the dead man in black.

She crouched down, completely ignoring the glaring smell of blood, and found a totem embroidered in black thread on the man's bullet-pierced collar—barely visible unless you looked closely.

A scorpion, with a tiny skull as the stinger on its tail.

"Not the Bennett family's people," Sophia stood up, her voice cold.

Nicholas walked over. His suit jacket still had wall dust from when he'd protected her. "I know."

He glanced at the totem, then toward the fire exit. There was a trail of bloody footprints on the floor. In one of them was a small piece of fabric stuck tight under a high heel.

"Looks like we're not the only ones who want her silenced forever," Nicholas said.

Sophia walked over, pulled out a tissue, and carefully picked up the fabric scrap.

The material was rough, not from Candice's dress. It was canvas, also embroidered with a black thread scorpion, and next to it, a half-finished letter—"N".

"Scorpion... N..." Sophia examined the fabric piece from all angles. "What kind of organization is this? Do gangsters do branded merch now?"

"Maybe it's someone's initials," Nicholas took the fabric piece. "Whatever it is, they failed tonight. They'll come again."

"Let them come." Sophia's gaze returned to the phone Graham had seized, now being carefully placed in an evidence bag by the security captain. "I'm curious to see what 'gift' Candice has prepared for this world."

The police sirens were blocked out by the heavy car windows, leaving only the flashing red and blue lights, silently flowing through the cabin, illuminating Sophia and Nicholas's profiles.

Facing the questioning officer, Nicholas's story was airtight.

A business retaliation gone wrong, some negligent security employees, and an emotionally unstable socialite.

As for the gunshots and dead body, those were casually attributed to rival gang provocation, all to be handled entirely by the Martinez Group's legal team.

The authorities got a decent story they could report, while the real undercurrents remained tightly concealed beneath that veneer of respectability.