“You should be dead.”
“I disappoint people often.”
Eliza rushed to him, but he lifted a hand.
“No. Listen first.”
He looked at the flash drive.
“Vale’s empire was never just money. The children were his insurance. He created false heirs, erased real ones, swapped identities when families paid enough, and kept proof on everyone who used him.”
Eliza whispered, “And Oliver?”
Arthur’s eyes filled with shame.
“Oliver was never swapped.”
Damian’s breath caught.
Arthur looked at him.
“He is your son.”
Damian closed his eyes for half a second, but the relief did not soften him. It made him more dangerous.
“Then why does Vale have those records?”
“Because I helped create them.”
Eliza stepped back as if he had struck her.
Arthur lowered his head.
“When Eliza found the first files, Vale threatened all of us. He said if she exposed him, he would destroy Damian publicly, take Oliver, and make sure no court in the country could prove the boy belonged to either of you. So I created a false paternity record before Vale could.”
Damian stared at him.
“You forged a document saying my son wasn’t mine?”
“I forged a bad document,” Arthur said. “One that would collapse under real testing. I thought it would buy time.”
“You thought?” Damian snapped. “You let that monster aim at my child.”
“I know.”
Arthur’s voice cracked.
“I know what I did.”
Above them, something heavy crashed.
A man screamed.
Evelyn’s radio burst with static.
“They’re breaking through the nave!”
Marcus’s voice came back, colder now.
“Time is over.”
The stone wall behind the monitors exploded inward.
Dust, sparks, and broken rock filled the room.
Eliza was thrown to the floor.
Damian covered Oliver.
Evelyn fired into the smoke.
Figures in black poured through the broken wall.
Then a second group came from the stairs.
For a moment, the hidden room became chaos — gunfire, shouting, shattered glass, the smell of smoke and stone dust.
Eliza crawled toward Oliver.
Damian reached for her.
Their fingers almost touched.
Then someone grabbed her from behind.
“Eliza!”
She screamed as an arm locked around her throat and dragged her backward.
Through the dust, she saw him.
Marcus Vale.
Not on a screen.
Not behind a speaker.
In front of her.
Tall, silver-haired, calm as a priest at a funeral.
He pressed a gun against her side and smiled at Damian.
“Now,” he said, “we can speak like family.”
Damian raised his weapon.
Marcus pulled Eliza tighter.
“Careful. Your son is watching.”
Oliver sobbed.
“Let Mommy go!”
Marcus looked at the boy with a strange softness that made Eliza’s skin crawl.
“You have her eyes.”
Damian’s voice was deadly.
“Say one more word to him.”
Marcus smiled wider.
“There it is. The proud father.”
Then he looked down at Eliza’s hand.
“The drive.”
Eliza had lost it in the fall.
Panic shot through her.
Her palm was empty.
Marcus noticed.
His smile vanished.
“Where is it?”
No one answered.
Then Oliver, still crying behind Damian, slowly opened his tiny hand.
The silver flash drive lay in his palm.
Eliza’s heart stopped.
Damian saw it too.
So did Marcus.
The room went silent in the middle of war.
Marcus whispered, “Bring it to me, Oliver.”
“No,” Eliza said.
Marcus pressed the gun harder against her.
“Bring it to me, or your mother dies.”
Oliver trembled.
Damian reached for him, but the boy stepped back.
“Oliver,” Damian said softly, “look at me.”
But Oliver was looking at Eliza.
His little face was wet with tears.
Then he did something no one expected.
He ran.
Not toward Marcus.
Not toward Damian.
He ran toward the old stone baptismal font near the wall and threw the flash drive into the water.
Marcus screamed.
“No!”
At that exact moment, Gabriel dropped through the broken ceiling like a shadow.
He landed behind Marcus and drove him away from Eliza.
The gun fired.
Eliza fell.
Damian shouted her name.
For one terrifying second, she could not feel anything.
Then she heard Oliver crying.
She heard Damian crawling toward her.
She heard Gabriel fighting Marcus in the smoke.
And she heard Evelyn scream:
“Gabriel, don’t!”
Marcus staggered back, blood on his mouth, but still smiling.
“You think water destroys what I built?”
Gabriel stood between him and Eliza.
“No,” Gabriel said. “But I do.”
He held up a small black device.
Evelyn went pale.
“Where did you get that?”
Gabriel looked at Eliza.
“From the man who saved you.”
“Samuel Reed?” she whispered.
Gabriel nodded.
“He did not hide only you. He hid the key.”
Marcus’s face changed for the first time.
True fear.
Gabriel pressed the button.
Every monitor in the room turned white.
Then files began uploading.
Hundreds.
Thousands.