Chapter 3 - The Sterling Protocol
The chaos that erupted in St. Jude Cathedral after Harrison Sterling lifted me from the floor was a symphony of elite panic. Five hundred socialites, CEOs, and corrupt politicians scrambled for the exits like rats abandoning a sinking ship, their designer gowns and Brioni tuxedos brushing against the dust of a reality they had spent millions to avoid. Camera shutters flashed blindly from the back—paparazzi who had bribed their way into the gallery or posed as catering staff, capturing every glorious, humiliating second of the Vance family’s public execution.
Arthur Vance collapsed into a pew, his face buried in his shaking hands, muttering incoherently about stock prices and federal investigations as his life’s work unraveled before his eyes. Chloe was screaming now—not the dainty, practiced whines of a spoiled debutante, but the high-pitched, feral shrieks of a tyrant whose kingdom had just been burned to the ground. She clawed at her veil, tearing the expensive lace to shreds and hurling the shattered neck of the champagne bottle across the marble floor.
"You ruined it! You ruined everything!" she sobbed, glaring down at me with eyes full of murder as Harrison’s men gently lifted me onto a portable tactical stretcher they had retrieved from an unmarked SUV parked right outside the cathedral doors.
I didn't answer her. The pain in my ribs was a white-hot furnace, burning away my consciousness piece by piece, but through the haze, I caught Harrison’s reflection in the polished glass of the mahogany doors.
He didn't look back at his bride. Not once.
Within minutes, I was loaded into the back of a black, armored Mercedes Sprinter outfitted with a full mobile trauma unit. The doors slammed shut, sealing out the flashing lights and the frantic shouts of the press. Inside, the hum of high-end medical equipment and the crisp, clean scent of antiseptic replaced the cloying smell of white orchids.
"Keep pressure on the wound, Miller," Harrison ordered, his sleeves rolled up, revealing thick, corded forearms bearing the faint, jagged scars of old shrapnel wounds. He wasn't just a billionaire playboy; he was a former Marine captain who had walked away from the family business a decade ago to run black-ops logistics before his father’s failing health forced him back into the gilded cage of the Sterling conglomerate.
"Vitals are dropping, boss," Miller said, his large hands pressing a heavy gauze pad firmly against my side. "Blood loss is significant. If we don't get her into surgery within twenty minutes, she's going into septic shock."
"We'll make it in twelve," Harrison said, his voice hard as iron. He turned his gaze back to me as the van accelerated smoothly into the rain-slicked city streets. "You always were stubborn, Aiden. I remember Sector Two. You stayed behind to cover the extraction of my entire squad when everyone else had already bugged out."
"Someone... had to," I whispered through cracked lips, my eyelids feeling like lead. "Orders were... orders."
"That wasn't in the mission brief," Harrison muttered, a strange, complicated shadow crossing his face. He reached out and gently removed a lock of ash-stained hair from my forehead. "That was just you being a damn fool. Why didn't you come back? When you 'died' three years ago... I checked the manifest. I knew your name wasn't on it."
I swallowed the metallic taste in my mouth, the memory of that night—the forged death certificate, the threats my father had made against my younger sister, the quiet exile into the deep black-ops units where no name existed—flashing behind my eyes.
"My father... made a deal," I breathed, the effort draining the last of my strength. "Stay dead... or Chloe doesn't get her precious future. And the brass... they needed ghosts."
Harrison’s jaw clenched so hard I thought his teeth would crack. The gold signet ring on his right hand bit into his palm as he squeezed his fist.
"Well," Harrison whispered, leaning in close so his voice cut through the hum of the heart monitor. "Your father just broke the terms of that arrangement. And as for the brass... they’re about to find out what happens when you wake a dragon."
The van lurked violently as it turned onto the private ramp leading directly to Sterling Tower’s rooftop helipad. Through the reinforced glass of the mobile unit, I saw the sleek silhouette of a black-hawk medevac waiting with its rotors spinning, kicking up a vortex of rain and wind.
May you like
As Miller and another medic wheeled the stretcher out into the howling storm, Harrison caught my hand. His grip was warm, solid, and utterly unyielding.
"Hang on, Captain Vance," he murmured against the wind. "We’re going to settle some accounts."
