Chapter 18 - Blood on the SilkA predator does not wait patiently for its prey to surrender.
Harrison Thorne did not entirely believe my phone call. He knew that the Iron Architect of Medicine did not bow easily. He wanted to ensure that when we met at the summit, I was sufficiently terrified to sign over the patent without a fight.
It was Friday afternoon, just hours before the summit. I was at the main laboratory in Queens, picking up the final batch of synthesized samples. The lab was quiet, the smell of sterile alcohol and cold steel hanging comfortably in the air.
I was standing at the front centrifuge station when the heavy glass doors shattered inward.
Three men in tactical gear poured into the lab. They weren't federal agents. They were corporate mercenaries.
“Dr. Hartwell!” the lead man shouted, raising a heavy crowbar. “Step away from the samples! You’re coming with us!”
My heart stopped. But before the scream could even leave my throat, the shadows of the lab came alive.
Daniel had insisted on traveling with me. He had been in the back office, speaking with the lead chemist.
He moved with a speed that defied human logic.
Daniel didn't draw a weapon. He didn't need to. He launched himself through the doorway, driving his massive shoulder directly into the chest of the lead mercenary. The impact sounded like a car crash. The man flew backward, crashing through a rolling cart of empty glass vials.
The second mercenary turned toward Daniel, raising his crowbar.
I didn't freeze. I grabbed a heavy, iron fire extinguisher from the wall mount and hurled it at the man’s knees. The cylinder struck bone with a sickening crunch, causing him to stumble and drop his weapon.
That microsecond of distraction was all Daniel needed.
He grabbed the man by the throat, hoisting him entirely off the floor with one hand, and slammed him brutally into the reinforced brick wall. The man dropped like a stone.
The third mercenary took one look at the towering, blood-spattered titan standing between him and me, and realized he was not fighting a venture capitalist. He was fighting a man who would gladly die to protect the woman behind him.
The man dropped his weapon and ran out the shattered front door.
Daniel stood in the center of the ruined lab, his chest heaving, his fists clenched. He turned to me, his dark eyes wide with a frantic, primal terror.
“Are you hurt?” he demanded, rushing over and checking my arms, my face, my neck.
“I’m fine,” I gasped, clutching his lapels, pulling him down to press my forehead against his. “I’m fine, Daniel. You stopped them.”
He pulled me into a crushing embrace, burying his face in my neck. “He sent them to take you. To use you as leverage tonight to force the signature.”
“He missed,” I whispered fiercely, pulling back to look him dead in the eye. “He missed, Daniel. And now, he has removed the last shred of mercy I was willing to offer him.”
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I looked at the shattered glass covering the immaculate floor of my institute.
“Go home and change into your tuxedo,” I commanded, the adrenaline shifting into pure, unadulterated matriarchal fury. “Harrison Thorne wants a war. Tonight, we give him an execution.”
