Chapter 145 The Imperial Impasse
Back inside the dark, crimson-lit boardroom, the air had turned suffocatingly thin.
Carlos Mason stood dead in front of Justin, his massive frame looming over his cousin’s desk space, his large hands flat against the mahogany table. The financial track records and dossiers they had fought over for months were now scattered across the floor like useless scraps of paper.
"Open the secure maintenance shaft, Justin," Carlos whispered, his voice dropping into a low, terrifyingly quiet register that vibrated through the room.
"You are the CEO. You possess the analog override key to the mechanical core. Don't dare to lie to my office and state the backup systems lack a manual release."
Justin rose to his full height, matching his cousin blow-for-blow, his sharp jaw locked into stone.
"The manual release is located three levels below the lobby tier, Carlos! Splicing into that grid while the primary server is wiped will instantly trigger the building's automated defensive vault locks. We will freeze the entire staff inside the structure for forty-eight hours."
"I don't care about your structure, and I don't care about your staff!"
Carlos roared, his absolute control completely vaporizing as he snatched Justin by the lapels of his immaculate suit jacket.
"My wife is currently the only asset that carries value in my universe! Give me the analog key, or I will use your body to break through that glass window!"
"Stand down, Carlos!" Dominic Ashford intervened smoothly, his large hand wrapping around Carlos’s wrist with a commanding, iron grip that forced a separation between the two titans.
"Justin is telling the truth regarding the vault parameters. If you force the mechanical core right now, you destroy our lone communication vector. Look at the emergency panel."
The primary console near the door suddenly hummed, a single bar of low-frequency satellite text clearing across the dark interface. It was a broken, heavily encrypted transmission from Derek Cooper’s line:
...SAFEHOUSE COMPROMISED... CORDOVA OPERATIVES EXECUTED EXTRACTION PLAY... TERESA HAS BEEN TAKEN... FLIGHT VECTOR MOVING TOWARD DOCKS...
Carlos stared at the screen, every single drop of color instantly leaving his sharp face. The gold ring in his pocket felt like an unendurable weight against his chest. He had won his father's throne, but his empty hands had officially triggered the destruction of his queen.