The silence inside the Moretti mansion was heavy, cold, and total. Built from imported Italian limestone and guarded by high iron gates overlooking Long Island Sound, the estate had not known real warmth in three years.

Julian pulled the trigger.

Click.

Julian’s eyes went wide with horror. He pulled the trigger again. Click. Click.

Lucas had emptied the firing pin mechanism on Julian's personal firearm hours earlier while Julian was arranging the tactical sweep.

Before Julian could drop the useless weapon, Lucas closed the distance like a lunging predator.

He grabbed Julian by the throat and slammed him violently against the massive oak dining table, shattering the crystal centerpieces.

Julian gasped for air, thrashing wildly, but Lucas’s grip was made of iron. The strength in Lucas’s arms was backed by three years of grief, pain, and betrayal.

"You took my wife," Lucas growled, his gray-blue eyes burning into Julian’s soul. "You took my son. And tonight, you tried to murder a little girl whose only crime was trying to save my life."

"Lucas... please..." Julian choked out, his face turning red, then purple. "We're... brothers..."

"My brother died three years ago," Lucas hissed.

With a powerful surge, Lucas dragged Julian toward the floor-to-ceiling glass windows overlooking the rocky cliffs above the ocean—the exact same drop where Isabella's car had plummeted three years prior.

He threw Julian through the glass.

The heavy plate glass shattered with a deafening roar. Julian tumbled out onto the stone balcony, bleeding from dozens of small cuts, coughing frantically as he crawled toward the edge of the railing.

Lucas stepped out onto the balcony, the ocean wind whipping his hair, the morning sun fully breaking through the fog.

Julian looked up at him, terrified, backing himself against the iron balcony railing.

"You think you've won?" Julian sobbed, blood running down his chin. "The evidence... everything... I sent it all to the federal prosecutors! If I die, your entire organization collapses! You'll go to prison for life!"

"I don't care about the organization, Julian," Lucas said quietly, standing over him. "I haven't cared about it for three years."

Lucas reached down, grabbed Julian by the lapels of his suit, and lifted him over the railing.

Julian shrieked in terror, his legs dangling two hundred feet above the jagged rocks and crashing surf below.

"Lucas! Don't! Please! I'll tell you where the board keeps the offshore accounts! I'll give you everything!"

Lucas stared at the man who had destroyed his life. He felt the cold urge to drop him—to watch him fall the way Isabella and Daniel had fallen.

Then, in his mind, he heard a small, trembling voice from earlier that night:

“Mister… are you dying like me?”

He saw Lily’s brown eyes. He saw the innocence he thought had been wiped from the world forever. If he dropped Julian now, he would remain the monster Julian had turned him into. He would be no better than the men who had murdered his son.

Lucas pulled Julian back over the railing and slammed him onto the concrete floor of the balcony.

Julian lay there, weeping and hyperventilating, completely broken.

Behind them, the sound of heavy footsteps echoed through the ruined house. Marcus stepped onto the balcony, followed by six armed officers from the Federal Bureau of Investigation—led by Special Agent Sarah Vance, Julian’s estranged sister, who had been quietly working with Lucas for six months to dismantle the offshore Syndicate board.

"Julian Vance," Agent Vance said, her voice shaking slightly as she looked down at her brother. "You are under arrest for the murders of Isabella Moretti, Daniel Moretti, and conspiracy to commit murder."