Chapter 2 - The Return to the Estate-2
The high-performance luxury SUV my law firm had provided for my transport tore through the dark, storm-swept ridges of Bel-Air, its tires screaming against the wet asphalt as the driver pushed the vehicle through the mountain switchbacks. The freezing summer rain battered the windshield in a relentless, blinding sheet that turned the skeletal silhouettes of the massive estates into a featureless, shifting grey wasteland.
The time was 2:14 p.m. We had precisely forty-six minutes before the final compliance enforcement orders were scheduled to hit the gates of the Blackwood estate, executing the permanent asset seizure under the National Security Fraud Acts.
Beside me in the passenger seat sat my twenty-year-old brother, Jake. His hands were clean now, the industrial grease beneath his fingernails scrubbed away, but his eyes were still wide, completely clear of the exhaustion that had defined his face when he slept on my couch twenty-four hours ago. He was clutching a brand new, heavy steel Snap-on tool chest against his knees—a duplicate of the exact set our grandfather had left him, repurchased with the first nominal advance from our lottery winnings that morning.
"Emily," Jake whispered, his voice trembling slightly as he looked out at the massive iron privacy gates looming through the gray sheets of water ahead. "Are we really doing this? If we walk onto that porch with the marshals... there’s no coming back. They’ll never forgive us."
"They never loved us, Jake," I said, my voice dropping into that cold, steady cadence that had guided me through eleven months of disarming roadside explosives in the dust. I adjusted the strap of my heavy knee brace, my fingers wrapping firmly around the aluminum handles of my crutches. "The night I called from the clinic, begging for five thousand dollars to save my joints, Madison told me to take an Advil so I wouldn't ruin her party. Our mother called my pain a drama. Our father hung up the phone because my blood was a bad timing for his corporate champagne. They didn't just leave me behind, Jake; they used my deployment as a blank check to steal our grandfather's legacy. The war is already over. We're just here to clean up the wreckage."
May you like
The SUV slammed to a halt at the curb of the Blackwood mansion—a sprawling, pristine white colonial estate that sat perched over the valley like a fortress of absolute wealth. Sitting right in the center of the circular driveway, mounted onto a massive flatbed transport trailer, was Madison’s brand new, custom-built luxury yacht. The polished fiberglass hull shone under the rain, its name painted in a sweeping, elegant gold calligraphy across the stern: The Sovereign Choice.
I pushed the heavy vehicle door open, lunging out into the freezing rain, the aluminum crutches clicking a sharp, lethal rhythm against the wet stones as Jake and Mr. Vance followed right behind my shadow.
