Chapter 11 - The Choice Evelyn Feared
Lucas arranged for two armed officers from a federal task force to guard Evelyn’s floor.
Not Boston police.
Evelyn had warned him that local officials were compromised.
He called the only federal agent whose name appeared in his father’s private notebook: Special Agent Rebecca Sloan.
She arrived twenty minutes later.
Lucas handed her the hospital assassin’s weapon, Harold’s records from the memory card, and the coded résumé.
“You expect me to believe the head of the Blackwood organization suddenly wants justice?” she asked.
“I want my daughter alive.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No. It’s better.”
Sloan studied him.
“You know what these files will do?”
“They’ll dismantle half my company.”
“They may put you in prison.”
Lucas looked through the hospital window at Emma sitting beside Evelyn’s bed.
“I’ll answer for what I did.”
“And what you didn’t know?”
“I built a house where men like Harold could hide. That part belongs to me.”
Sloan nodded once.
Then Lucas gave her instructions for the shipyard.
Emma met him near the elevator.
“You’re going away.”
“I have to bring someone home.”
“The gray-haired lady?”
“Yes.”
“She lied.”
“She also saved your life.”
Emma looked toward her mother’s room.
“Mommy says people can do one good thing and one bad thing.”
“Your mother is smarter than me.”
“Are you coming back?”
Lucas crouched.
This time, he did not make an easy promise.
“I’m going to fight very hard to come back.”
Emma reached into the apron pocket and handed him a tiny plastic bracelet.
It was decorated with faded blue stars.
“For luck.”
Lucas slid it over the wrist beside his luxury watch.
It looked absurd.
It was the most valuable thing he had ever worn.
As the elevator doors opened, Evelyn called weakly from her bed.
“Lucas.”
He entered the room.
She held his gaze.
“Harold wants you angry. That’s when he controls you.”
Lucas nodded.
“What does he fear?”
“The truth being seen by everyone at once.”
Lucas looked at Agent Sloan.
Then at the memory card.
A plan formed.
He kissed Emma’s forehead.
Then, after six stolen years, he leaned down and pressed his lips gently to Evelyn’s.
“I’ll come back.”
Evelyn touched his face.
May you like
“Come back as Emma’s father. Not as Boston’s king.”
👉 Lucas left for the shipyard carrying Harold’s evidence, but instead of planning revenge, he was preparing to destroy the empire that had protected them both.
