Chapter 93
Chapter 93
Ethan looked up. "Eddie, is this what you meant — that you didn't find out until twenty minutes later?"
Eddie was silent for a long time, then slowly lowered his head. "I failed in my duty."
"Failed in your duty?"
Schumann almost laughed from sheer anger. "Lena nearly died there, and you're calling it a failure of duty?"
Ethan raised a hand, signaling him to hold off.
Then he looked at Eddie, his voice even calmer than before. "Do you know why I came here first instead of going straight to Vertex Holdings Group and dragging everyone down with me?"
Eddie's throat moved. He said nothing.
"Because I still wanted to see if there was even one person in this precinct who could stand up straight tonight and act like a decent human being."
"Apparently, there isn't."
Those words hit harder than a slap across the face in front of everyone.
Whatever Eddie had been holding together finally broke.
He stood there, fingers slowly curling into fists. Then, a moment later, he actually stepped forward.
In the middle of the lobby, he slowly dropped to his knees.
"I was incompetent."
---
The moment Eddie knelt, everything shifted.
This wasn't just an apology.
This was the precinct officially bowing its head before Ethan tonight.
The men behind him looked worse by the second. Two of them tried to hold out a little longer, but once they saw Eddie on his knees, no one dared stay standing. One after another, the sound of knees hitting the floor echoed through the room until the lobby was filled with people kneeling.
Jack was already completely prostrate on the ground.
The man Schumann had slammed onto the desk earlier had gone down on his own.
For a moment, Ethan was the only one in the entire lobby still sitting.
Schumann stood at his side, barely keeping the fury in his eyes in check. He'd been with Ethan long enough to know exactly what a scene like this meant.
This wasn't just beating someone into submission.
Starting tonight, when these people saw Ethan, their first thought wouldn't be how to push back. It would be whether they should kneel.
Ethan sat there, his gaze moving slowly from face to face.
"Kneeling doesn't mean you're off the hook."
"It just means you still have the right to keep talking."
"Now I'm giving you one last chance."
"Kroll. Kalman. Who are they really working for."
No one in the lobby dared speak right away.
Because once it went that far, it wasn't just giving up Decker anymore. It meant dragging whoever was above him down too.
Eddie raised his head, his face pale. "Sir, if this goes any higher, it stops being a South District matter."
"You think I don't know that?"
"That's not what I meant. I'm saying if we really dig into this, the fallout will be serious."
"Since when is it your job to worry about the fallout for me?"
That one sentence landed, and sweat broke out on Eddie's forehead instantly.
He finally understood.
He'd still been thinking about consequences. About limits. About knowing when to stop once you'd traced things back far enough. But Ethan had never intended to stop. Not from the very beginning of tonight.
Whoever touched Lena. Whoever touched the child. They were going to die.
That wasn't said in anger.
It was the rule now, laid out plainly in front of them.
Eddie finally spoke, his voice low. "Behind Kalman, there's a connection to a certain department in the North District. A department that doesn't appear on any official South District list. Kroll has been in contact with someone from the medical research building over the past two months."
The medical research building.
The moment those words were out, Schumann's expression changed on the spot.
Even Ethan's eyes shifted slightly.
Because that meant tonight wasn't just someone in the South District making moves. Someone had been using Decker, using the Black Tiger Society, using people inside the precinct to stir things up.
Russell hadn't died clean.
And he'd already started testing the waters again.
Ethan was quiet for two seconds. Then he smiled.
But this time, the smile was colder.
"Good."
He stood up, and the weight in the room pressed down another notch.
"I thought I'd have to dig through a few more people before anything deeper surfaced."
"Looks like it couldn't hold up as long as I expected."
Eddie's heart sank. He looked up instinctively. "Sir..."
"Effective immediately, this building is locked down."
"Every roster for tonight — on duty, off duty, on leave, out on assignment — every single one gets sent to Vertex Holdings Group."
"Kroll and Kalman. I want them in front of me within half an hour."
"If they're not, I'll assume you're buying them time."
With each sentence, the faces in the lobby went a shade whiter.
Lock down the building. Hand over the rosters. Hand over the men.
This wasn't an investigation anymore. This was Ethan putting his boot on the precinct's neck in front of everyone.
And the most terrifying part was that no one could say no.
Ethan walked toward the door, then stopped and turned his head toward Eddie. "One more thing."
A chill ran down Eddie's back. "Go ahead."
"I remember what you did tonight. Kneeling like that."
Eddie started to breathe again.
Then Ethan added, quietly: "Whether you live through this depends on whether it was worth it."
Eddie went completely still.
The meaning was clear enough.
Tonight's kneel had bought him one thing: not dying yet.
But if a single lie came out later, if one person wasn't handed over, if one piece of information was held back, he was still dead.
Ethan said nothing more. He didn't look at them again. He walked out.
Schumann followed. At the door, he turned and swept his gaze across the room full of kneeling men, then let out a cold laugh.
"Don't be in a rush to get up. Nobody told you to move. Stay down there and think hard about whether there's anything you haven't come clean about yet."
---
Once the car door shut, Schumann could barely contain himself. "Boss, the people from the medical research building actually showed their hand?"
"Yes."
"So what's next — do we grab Kroll and Kalman directly, or do we follow their connections and hit everything at once?"
Ethan looked out at the deepening night and spoke in a low, steady voice.
"Bring them to Vertex Holdings Group first."
"Let Jennifer start the questioning."
"The South District people — the ones who need to keep kneeling, keep kneeling. The ones who need to hang, keep hanging."
"Once everything's been traced to the end, I'll go find the one who's still sitting back and watching."
Schumann's eyes lit up. "Russell?"
Ethan didn't answer directly. He just said, quietly:
"He reached out again. So this time, I'm going to cut that hand off for good."
The headlights cut through the dark as the car drove straight toward Vertex Holdings Group.
---
At that moment, Decker was still hanging outside the entrance to Vertex Holdings Group.
The wind came in waves. The blood on his face had long since dried. He was barely holding together. Eldon, standing nearby, had been there less than twenty minutes, and his legs were already shaking badly.
But the crowd watching from a distance kept growing.
Because everyone knew tonight wasn't over.
---
Starting tonight, the entire South District would understand —
Don't touch Lena.
Don't touch the child.
And Ethan is not someone anyone gets to walk over.