Chapter 9 - CORNERED IN THE DARK
The room’s overhead lights suddenly flashed on, blinding in their intensity.
Standing in the doorway, wearing a soaked black raincoat, his right hand gripping a silenced automatic pistol, was Victor Vance.
Beside him stood two heavy-set men in dark suits, their weapons drawn and raised.
Richard moved instinctively, placing his body between Victor’s gun and Sarah, his hands raised calmly to chest height.
"You really thought the decoy Maybach would fool me, Vance?" Victor chuckled darkly, stepping into the study, the heavy soles of his boots leaving wet prints on the Persian rug. "You sent your car to Queens while you took a delivery van to Midtown. Clever. Very clever. But I know how Sarah thinks. She's predictable when she's desperate."
"How did you get in here, Victor?" Sarah hissed, clutching the blue binder tightly against her chest. "Julian would kill you if he knew you were in his private study."
"Julian isn't going to kill anyone," Victor sneered, taking two steps closer, pointing the silenced barrel directly at Richard’s forehead. "Because Julian doesn't know about this. You see, Sarah, when I saw the news that Richard Vance—the billionaire founder of Vanguard Equity—was helping you, I realized this wasn't just a domestic dispute anymore. This is a multi-million-dollar acquisition."
Victor looked at Richard with cold, greedy eyes.
"Here's how this works, Mr. Vanguard," Victor instructed smoothly. "You are going to log into your corporate portal right now and initiate a five-million-dollar wire transfer to a private account in Zurich. Once the funds clear, I take the binder, I take Sarah, and you walk out of here alive. If you refuse, I shoot you, I take the binder anyway, and I tell Julian I caught Sarah attempting a burglary with an unknown accomplice."
Richard looked at the barrel of the gun inches from his face. His expression didn't show panic; it showed absolute, icy disdain.
"You're a small-minded extortionist, Victor," Richard said, his voice completely calm. "You think having a gun makes you smart. You didn't check the hallway security cameras when you came up the service lift, did you?"
Victor’s eyes flickered with a fraction of a second of doubt. "Don't play games with me, Vance."
"I don't play games with cheap security guards," Richard said flatly. "I buy the security companies."
Before Victor could react, a series of heavy flash-bang grenades shattered the high floor-to-ceiling glass windows of the study!
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Blinding white light and deafening, concussive pressure waves filled the room!
The heavy glass windows exploded inward in a rain of safety crystals as four tactical SWAT officers in black body armor swung into the study on ropes dropped from a helicopter hovering directly above the building!
"LAPD SWAT! DROP YOUR WEAPONS! ON THE GROUND NOW!"
Victor Vance was thrown off balance by the concussive blast, dropping his gun as two tactical officers tackled him violently to the floor, driving his face into the rug and snapping heavy zip-ties around his wrists! His two accomplices were slammed against the wall, their weapons kicked away across the parquet floor!
Through the shattered window frame, the roar of the police helicopter’s blades beat against the foggy night air, its powerful spotlight illuminating the entire study in brilliant, dazzling white.
Stepping through the shattered terrace door, accompanied by four federal agents in jackets marked FBI, was Deputy Commissioner Miller—Richard's contact from the NYPD.
"You took your sweet time, Jim," Richard said, casually adjusting his jacket collar as the smoke cleared.
"Traffic on Park Avenue was terrible, Richard," Commissioner Miller replied with a wry smile. "We had to wait for the federal warrants to clears."
The lead FBI agent walked over to Sarah, pulling a gold shield from his belt.
"Mrs. Sterling," the agent said respectfully. "I'm Special Agent Davis with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Mr. Vance presented your evidence to our Washington director two hours ago. We have sufficient cause to seize all Sterling Global assets and execute an emergency arrest warrant for Julian Sterling."
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Sarah stood in the center of the ruined study, looking at the blue binder in her hands, then at the police helicopter outside, then at Richard.
The nightmare was finally over.
