Chapter 65
Luke Victor's POV
I thought Lily's departure would bring a moment's peace to this suffocating study.
I was wrong.
Less than an hour later, the door slammed open again. Lily had returned, but this time the fury on her face had been replaced by the vicious excitement of a hunter with her prey cornered.
"Luke, we got him!" She slapped a fresh report onto my desk, her voice dripping with undisguised satisfaction. "Caught red-handed!"
I tore my gaze from that photograph—the one that had been gnawing at my composure—and focused on the document she'd thrust before me.
It was an investigation report Andy's team had compiled overnight. Their efficiency was almost frightening.
The first page showed several high-resolution surveillance screenshots.
A black, older-model Dodge van. It appeared in every blind spot around the West Side Logistics Center during the timeframe of the arson.
No license plates. Suspicious movements. But Andy's people had tracked it through the city's surveillance grid anyway, following it to its final destination—an abandoned auto salvage yard on the outskirts of the city.
"We found the vehicle. Half-destroyed, but the engine serial number was still intact," Lily's words tumbled out in a victorious rush. "I had my people run the original registration. The van belonged to a shell company that declared bankruptcy last year. And the company's legal representative? Bill. One of Hank's most trusted lieutenants."
My fingertip tapped lightly on the report.
Bill. I knew that name. One of Hank's lapdogs for over twenty years. The man who handled all his dirty work.
But that wasn't even the damning part.
Page two contained bank transaction records. Three days before the arson, an offshore account under Bill's name had received an anonymous wire transfer of five hundred thousand dollars.
"Half a million to torch millions worth of our equipment—and burn down Hank's own property in the process." Lily's laugh was cold and mocking. "What a grand gesture. The old bastard's desperate enough to sacrifice his own assets just to hurt us. Destroying the enemy at the cost of destroying himself."
I leaned back in my chair, studying what appeared to be an airtight chain of evidence. But I didn't wear the expression of triumph Lily had expected.
Hank's move was both stupid and vicious.
Stupid, because he thought he'd covered his tracks, never realizing that in the face of absolute technological superiority and power, his tricks were full of holes.
Vicious, because he was willing to cut off his own arm just to deliver a warning to me—and to Emily's transformation plan. A brutal demonstration.
He was using this catastrophic loss to send a message to the wavering conservatives in the Victor family: Follow Luke down his new path, and you'll lose everything.
He wanted to strangle reform with fear.
"Luke, the evidence is solid. We can go to the police right now and have Bill arrested! I want to see how that old bastard Hank talks his way out of this one!" Lily was already salivating at the thought of watching our enemy fall.
I shook my head slowly, picking up the report as if admiring a piece of art. "Too easy."
Sending him to prison would only make him a tragic martyr who "sacrificed himself for the family." What I wanted was for everyone to watch Hank get consumed by the very fire he'd started—to see his reputation go up in flames, his credibility reduced to ashes.
In my mind's eye, I saw Emily standing in those ruins, analyzing the scene with cold precision.
"There's an insider," she'd said.
"This was premeditated arson," she'd said.
My weapon had already pointed me in the right direction. All that remained was for me to decide how to use this evidence to stage the most spectacular reversal.
"Luke?" Lily's voice pulled me back. She looked puzzled by my prolonged silence.
I lifted my eyes. The tumultuous currents of longing and suspicion that had churned in them moments ago had settled into cold calculation and lethal intent.
"They want to see us turn on each other, don't they? They want to watch me spiral out of control because of Emily's supposed betrayal?" The smile that touched my lips held no warmth whatsoever. "Then I'll show them exactly what I do when I lose control."
I picked up the internal line and dialed my chief of staff.
"Notify all Victor family elders and core board members," my voice was calm but allowed no room for argument. "One hour from now. Victor Mansion. We're convening a family tribunal."
"A tribunal?" Even Lily looked stunned.
A family tribunal was the Victor family's highest form of internal judgment.
It could only be called for matters of betrayal or actions that threatened the family's very foundation.
The last one had been convened over a decade ago, when my father had personally sent an uncle to prison for attempting to collude with outsiders and sell out family interests.
"Luke, for Hank alone, calling a tribunal seems a bit—"
"He didn't just torch a warehouse," I cut her off, my gaze sharp as a blade. "He attacked the Victor family's future. I want everyone to see what happens to those who stand in the way."
Hank wanted to bind me with the old rules? Fine. I'd use the Victor family's most merciless rules to bind him instead. To strangle him with them.
I needed him and everyone lurking behind him to understand: times had changed.
The Victor family answered to me now.
I hung up and stood, walking to the floor-to-ceiling window. Outside, the night was dark and deep. A storm was brewing.
I pulled out my phone and sent Andy a message.
[Send a copy of the full investigation report on the West Side warehouse case to Miss Windsor. Official channel—corporate legal department.]
My Miss Windsor. I'd built you a stage, prepared your script. Now it was time for your entrance.
I was curious to see who you'd cut first with the blade I'd just handed you.
---
The scent of incense hung heavy in the air of the chapel.
Before the long blackwood altar stood generations of Victor family ancestors. The family chapel, usually vast and solemn in its emptiness, was now packed with bodies. The atmosphere was so oppressive it was nearly suffocating.
Over a dozen Victor family elders sat in high-backed, ornately carved chairs, their expressions grave.
The remaining directors and core family members stood in rows on either side. No one dared speak.
Hank stood in the center, his face ashen. He clearly hadn't expected me to make such a spectacle of this.
I walked in slowly, Lily at my side, and took my seat at the head of the gathering. My expression was impassive as I regarded him.
"Luke, what the hell do you think you're doing?" Hank finally snapped, unable to contain himself any longer. "Calling a family tribunal out of nowhere—are you trying to tear this family apart?"
"Uncle Hank, patience." I raised a hand slightly, and Andy began distributing copies of a document to every elder present.
"Gentlemen," my gaze swept across the room, my voice clear and steady, "three days ago, the West Side Logistics Center was destroyed by fire. Substantial losses were incurred. I've called you here today to show you something—to show you exactly how that fire started."
The elders opened their copies. As they took in the photographs of the van, saw Bill's name, read about that five-hundred-thousand-dollar wire transfer, every face in the room changed.
Hank's pupils contracted violently. He stared at me with an expression that combined shock, rage, and a trace of panic he couldn't quite suppress.
He hadn't anticipated that I'd trace this back to him so quickly—or that I'd present the evidence in a way that left him absolutely no room to fight back.