Chapter 18 - The Fall of the Coward
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Total chaos erupted in the penthouse.
Silas’s strike team opened fire before their boots even hit the floor. The two mercenaries flanking Matthias were shredded by automatic gunfire, collapsing into bloody heaps on the expensive rug.
Matthias shrieked in terror, throwing his arms over his head as debris rained down around him. He scrambled backward, slipping on the blood of his own men, trying to retreat toward the ruined doorway.
Silas didn't hesitate. He dove across the floor, ignoring the gunfire, and scooped up his discarded pistol.
He moved with terrifying speed, cutting off Matthias’s escape route. Silas grabbed Matthias by the lapels of his white suit and slammed him violently against the remaining pristine wall of the penthouse.
Matthias gasped, his silver revolver clattering out of his hands. The manic confidence he had shown moments ago entirely vanished, replaced instantly by the pathetic, weeping coward Serena remembered.
“Wait! Wait!” Matthias pleaded, blood dripping from a cut on his forehead. “Silas, please! We can make a deal! The Sinaloa cartel has billions! I can get you a piece! I can make you a king!”
Silas pressed the barrel of his pistol directly against the bottom of Matthias’s chin, forcing the terrified man to look him in the eyes.
“I am already a king, Matthias,” Silas said, his voice deadly quiet over the sounds of the dying mercenaries. “And you came into my castle.”
“Serena!” Matthias screamed, his eyes rolling frantically toward the sofa. “Serena, please! Tell him to stop! I’m the father! You can't let him kill the father of your baby!”
Serena sat on the velvet sofa, holding her newborn daughter securely against her chest. She looked at the man who had lied to her, cheated on her, endangered her life in Connecticut, and then brought a war to her living room just moments after she had given birth.
She felt no pity. She felt no lingering attachment. She only felt a fierce, protective instinct for the child in her arms.
“You stopped being a father the night you brought Fiona to the Christmas party, Matthias,” Serena said, her voice cold and absolute. “You are nothing to us.”
Matthias opened his mouth to beg again, but he never got the chance.
Silas didn't shoot him. He lowered the gun from Matthias’s chin, stepped back, and delivered a brutal, shattering blow to Matthias’s knee with a heavy tactical boot.
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Matthias screamed in agony, collapsing to the floor, his kneecap completely destroyed.
“I told you I wouldn't kill you,” Silas said, standing over the weeping man. Silas looked over at his strike team leader. “Bag him. Take him to the black site in Gary, Indiana. Make sure he stays alive. But make sure he never walks, talks, or sees sunlight again.”
