Chapter 196 The Titan Burns the City
"Do not tell me he is going to live," I said. "Tell me you are going to kill the men who put him on that table."
Tristan stood in the doorway of the private clinic waiting room. He stopped. His eyes tracked the crimson stains soaking the front of my wool jacket. The blood coated my hands. It dried under my fingernails.
"I need names, Mina," Tristan said. His voice lacked heat. It lacked comfort. It held nothing but a cold, empty void.
"Oliver Pembroke," I answered. I sat on the sterile plastic chair. I did not cry. The tears burned away hours ago, replaced by a deep, suffocating rage. "And the men he hired. They operate out of the textile mill by the river. They set an ambush. Marcus pushed me into the car and took the bullet."
Tristan did not cross the room to hold me. He did not ask if I was hurt. He saw the blood. He recognized the shift in my posture. He knew the woman sitting in the chair was no longer the forgiving wife who wanted to fight in the light.
I wanted blood.
"You warned me," I whispered. I stared at my stained hands. "You told me they do not negotiate. You told me they extort. I did not listen. I played the arrogant Chairman, and Marcus paid the price."
Tristan crouched in front of me. He reached out and wrapped his large hands over my blood-soaked fingers. He did not flinch at the mess.
"You are the Chairman," Tristan stated. The absolute certainty in his tone cut through the sterile hum of the clinic. "You govern the board. You govern the empire. But you cannot govern the dirt. That is my domain. Let me go back to the dirt."
I looked into his gray eyes. The devoted father vanished. The patient husband disappeared. The titan of the Johnston Group waited behind his gaze, a chained beast begging to be released.
"Take the gloves off," I ordered. The words tasted like ash and iron. "Burn the eastern sector to the ground. I do not care about the police. I do not care about the cost. End them."
Tristan let go of my hands. He stood up.
He pulled his phone from his inside pocket. He walked to the far corner of the waiting room. He did not raise his voice. He spoke in a low, flat cadence. He spoke the language of pure, unadulterated power.
"Execute the sweep," Tristan commanded into the receiver. "All targets. No survivors."
He ended the call. He dialed another number.
"The Vanguard shipping docks," Tristan said. "Sink the fleet. If the port authority interferes, buy them. If they refuse the money, break them."
I sat in the chair and watched the monster work.
I spent three years hating this version of my husband. I despised his ruthless control. I despised the way he dismantled human lives like they were numbers on a spreadsheet. But sitting in the clinic, with Marcus bleeding out on an operating table fifty feet away, the monster felt like salvation.
Diego paced the hallway outside the waiting room. He guarded the door. Every ten minutes, his radio buzzed with fragmented reports from the city.
The eastern sector did not just fall. It shattered.
Tristan unleashed a level of violence the capital had never witnessed. He did not fight a corporate war. He fought an extermination campaign.
"Explosion at the river textile mill," Diego reported from the doorway, his earpiece glowing in the dim light. "The building collapsed. Local police are receiving orders to stand down and reroute traffic."
Tristan nodded. He stared out the clinic window into the dark night. He did not smile. He did not celebrate. He treated the destruction like a menial chore.
An hour passed. A surgeon emerged from the double doors. He wore green scrubs. He looked exhausted.
I stood up. My knees locked.
"The bullet shattered the collarbone and missed the artery by a fraction of an inch," the surgeon said. "He lost a massive amount of blood, but we stabilized him. He will live."
The air rushed back into my lungs. I reached out and grabbed the back of the plastic chair to keep from falling. Diego let out a harsh, jagged breath and leaned his head against the wall.
"Thank you," I told the surgeon.
"He is in recovery," the doctor added. "No visitors until morning."
The surgeon walked away. I stood in the quiet room. Marcus would live. The crushing guilt on my chest lightened, leaving room for the cold reality of the night to settle in.
I turned my head. The television mounted in the corner of the waiting room played the local news on mute. Bright red breaking news banners flashed across the bottom of the screen.
Helicopter footage showed the Vanguard shipping docks consumed by massive, billowing fires. Three cargo ships burned in the water.
The screen cut to a different location. An underground casino in the warehouse district. Federal tactical teams swarmed the entrance, dragging men out in handcuffs.
The screen changed again. A black sedan, pulled from the bottom of the river. A body bag rested on the pavement next to the dripping car.
I walked toward the television. I watched the chaos unfold.
Oliver Pembroke was dead. The Vanguard fleet was ash. The syndicate leadership was either in federal custody on planted evidence or rotting at the bottom of the river. The shadow network that terrorized my family, stole my ships, and put a bullet in my protector was erased from existence.
In a single night.
I turned away from the screen. I looked at Tristan. He stood by the window, his phone silent in his hand. He accomplished the impossible. He protected his family.
But a realization pierced my brain.