Chapter 15
Vanessa struck back within forty-eight hours.
It was 2:17 a.m.
The alarms went off.
Not the perimeter alarms. The fire alarms.
The entire house was screaming.
Michael was out of bed in an instant, grabbing the gun he kept in his nightstand (he had never owned a gun before Vanessa. Now he slept with one under his pillow).
Cole was already in the hallway, his own weapon drawn.
“Stay with the children!” he shouted at Michael. “Don’t come out until I say it’s clear!”
Michael ran to Lily’s room first. She was awake, crying, confused. He grabbed her and ran to Ethan’s room. The boy was already up, his backpack on, his phone in his hand recording everything.
“Dad?”
“Stay behind me,” Michael said.
Smoke was starting to fill the upstairs hallway. Thick, black, acrid. It was coming from the back of the house—from the kitchen and garage area.
Below them, they heard shouting. Gunshots.
Two of them.
Then silence.
“Cole!” Michael yelled.
No answer.
The smoke was getting thicker. They couldn’t stay upstairs. The fire would cut off the stairs any second.
Michael herded the children to the second-floor balcony.
“Ethan,” he said. “I need you to be brave. I’m going to lower Lily down first. Then you. Then me. Do exactly what I say. No arguments. Understand?”
Ethan nodded. His face was pale but steady.
Michael lifted Lily over the railing. The drop was fifteen feet. Too far to jump. He lowered her as far as his arms would reach.
“Let go, baby!” he shouted over the roar of the fire. “I won’t let you fall!”
Lily squeezed her eyes shut and let go.
Michael caught her by the wrists, lowering her the last few feet until her feet touched the grass.
“Run to the gate!” he yelled. “Find a policeman! Don’t stop for anything!”
Lily ran.
Next was Ethan.
The boy climbed over the railing without hesitation. Michael lowered him the same way. Halfway down, a window exploded behind them—shower of glass and flame. Ethan flinched but didn’t make a sound. His feet hit the ground running.
Now it was Michael’s turn.
He climbed over.
Below him, the flames were licking the balcony. The heat was intense—like standing in an oven. He was just about to drop when he heard a voice behind him.
“Leaving so soon, Michael?”
He turned.
Vanessa stood in the smoke-filled hallway.
She was wearing black from head to toe. In one hand, she held a gun. In the other, a lit cigarette. She looked like an avenging angel. Beautiful. Terrifying. Completely insane.
“You set my house on fire,” Michael said.
“Our house,” she corrected. “Or it was, until you decided to be greedy. You could have given me my money. We could have parted friends. But no. You had to dig. You had to find my ex-husbands. You had to call the FBI. You forced my hand, Michael. All of this is your fault.”
She raised the gun.
“The children are already gone,” Michael said, stalling. “There’s nothing left for you here. Just put the gun down, Vanessa. Walk away. We can still end this without anyone else getting hurt.”
Vanessa laughed.
“Walk away? With the FBI investigating me for murder? With two hundred million dollars at stake? With my reputation in ruins? No, Michael. I don’t walk away from fights. I win them. And tonight—tonight I win everything.”
She took a step closer.
“You see, the police are going to find your charred bodies in the morning. They’re going to find the suicide note I wrote for you—confessing that you killed Max the dog, that you abused the children, that you couldn’t live with the shame of what you’d done. They’ll find the gun in your hand. They’ll call it a tragic murder-suicide. And the children? Poor, orphaned children. They’ll need a guardian. Who better than their loving, grieving stepmother? The woman who tried so hard to save them from their violent father? I’ll get everything, Michael. The money. The company. The kids. All of it. And you’ll just be another sad footnote in my perfect life.”
She raised the gun and aimed it at his chest.
May you like
“Goodbye, Michael. It was almost fun.”
She pulled the trigger.
