Chapter 16 - The Truth Behind the Curse
With federal reinforcements finally swarming the pier, medical teams stabilized Elena while armed agents cuffed Julian Vance, pinning him against a police cruiser.
Mark walked up to the cuffed executive, his face covered in rain and blood. "Why, Julian? Why my family? Why go to these insane lengths to destroy us?"
Julian spat blood onto the wet pavement, his eyes burning with a psychotic, pathetic rage. "Because your wife’s father didn't lose his company in a bad market deal twenty years ago, Mark. I stole it from him! I murdered him and framed it as a suicide!"
Elena listened from the back of the ambulance, tears mixing with the rain on her cheeks as the truth of her father's death finally came to light.
"He was going to expose me," Julian hissed through his shattered jaw. "I built my entire fortune on his blood! And every time I looked at Elena, every time I saw her happy with you and those pathetic children, it reminded me that his bloodline survived! I couldn't rest until I wiped every memory of him off the face of the earth!"
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Mark looked at the broken, miserable monster standing before him. The mystery that had tormented their lives was stripped naked in the rain—it wasn't a curse, it wasn't random bad luck, it was simply the cowardice of a greedy man terrified of his own sins.
"You failed, Julian," Mark said quietly, his voice carrying the weight of total victory. "Her father’s bloodline didn't die. It defeated you."
