Chapter 6 - Fiona’s Price
I met Fiona without Matthias.
Gabriel came with me.
We found her inside a twenty-four-hour diner in Queens, wearing borrowed sweatpants beneath a cashmere coat that probably cost more than my first car.
The diamond necklace was gone.
She looked younger without it.
And frightened.
“Where's Matthias?”
“Not here.”
Relief crossed her face.
That irritated me.
“You don't get to be afraid of facing him after sleeping with him.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
She looked at the untouched coffee in front of her.
“I didn't plan for that part.”
I sat opposite her.
“Which part did you plan?”
“Getting close.”
Gabriel remained standing near the booth.
Fiona began talking.
Victor recruited her fourteen months earlier.
At first, the assignment was corporate espionage.
Learn what Matthias knew.
Gain access to acquisition documents.
Report meetings.
Then Victor encouraged her to become indispensable.
She did.
The affair began months later.
“Did Matthias know you worked for Victor?”
“No.”
“Did you know I was pregnant?”
Her eyes filled.
“Yes.”
I looked away.
That answer hurt in a place I did not want anyone to see.
Gabriel interrupted.
“What does Victor want?”
Fiona slid a phone across the table.
A photograph showed a handwritten page.
My father's handwriting.
At the top:
Recovery authority: Serena Carroway.
Below it were instructions referencing biometric authorization.
“My fingerprint?”
Fiona shook her head.
“Voice.”
I stared at her.
“My voice unlocks something?”
“Not exactly. Your father recorded you.”
“When?”
“You were twenty-one.”
I remembered.
Dad had bought new accounting software and asked me to read random phrases into a microphone while testing it.
I had teased him for being terrible with technology.
The memory almost broke me.
“He created a voiceprint.”
Gabriel asked, “For what system?”
“A private archive.”
“Location?”
“Victor thinks Richard has it.”
“And you?”
“I think Daniel hid it somewhere Richard couldn't access.”
My phone rang.
Matthias.
I declined it.
Fiona watched.
“I loved him.”
The words came quietly.
I looked at her.
“Don't.”
“I know you don't want to hear it.”
“You're right.”
“He never told me he would leave you.”
That surprised me.
Fiona gave a bitter smile.
“He never promised anything. That's almost worse.”
I did not defend him.
“He loves you,” she said.
I stood.
“You don't get to tell me that either.”
Gabriel's phone buzzed.
He read the message.
Then looked at Fiona.
“Victor knows you're here.”
Her face drained.
“How?”
The diner's front windows exploded.
Gabriel threw himself across the table.
Glass rained over us.
People screamed.
A black SUV accelerated past outside.
No gunfire followed.
Instead, something rolled across the floor.
A phone.
Its screen was already playing a video.
Richard Dre sat tied to a chair.
My mother was beside him.
Victor stood behind them.
He looked so familiar that the scene became surreal.
Christmas Eve, he had kissed my cheek and asked when the baby was due.
Now he smiled into the camera.
“Merry Christmas, Serena.”
Fiona began shaking.
Victor continued.
“Your father complicated my life for eleven years. Richard complicated it for nearly forty.”
He rested one hand on Richard's shoulder.
“Family can be exhausting.”
Richard's face was bruised.
My mother looked furious rather than afraid.
Victor held up a small black device.
“You have Daniel's evidence. I have the server capable of reading his archive. Unfortunately, Daniel had a sentimental streak.”
He smiled.
“I need his daughter's voice.”
The video ended with an address.
An abandoned Hensley research building in Bridgeport.
And a deadline.
Noon.
I checked the time.
9:38.
Gabriel took the phone.
“We don't go.”
“My mother is there.”
“So is a trap.”
“I know.”
“Then we plan.”
Fiona whispered, “There's something else.”
We looked at her.
“Victor isn't planning to trade them.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I wrote his crisis strategy.”
My anger sharpened.
“You wrote what?”
“He made me prepare public responses for multiple scenarios.”
“What scenario is this?”
Her voice cracked.
“Richard dies during an attempted kidnapping. Your mother dies as a civilian casualty. Matthias becomes acting chairman.”
“And me?”
She looked at my stomach.
“You and the baby disappear.”
The diner seemed to tilt.
“Disappear how?”
“I don't know.”
“Yes, you do.”
Tears spilled down her face.
“He needed Matthias emotionally destroyed and controllable.”
I understood.
A grieving husband.
A dead father.
A dead wife.
An unborn daughter.
Matthias would inherit control of Dre Holdings while Victor operated behind him.
“What about Fiona?” Gabriel asked.
She gave a hollow laugh.
“I was supposed to comfort him.”
I stared at her.
She had helped build the cage.
Now she realized she would live inside it too.
My phone rang again.
Matthias.
This time I answered.
“Where are you?”
His voice was frantic.
“Working.”
“Serena, Gabriel took you out of the safe house.”
“I asked him to.”
“Where?”
“Why?”
“Because my father and your mother are missing.”
“I know.”
Silence.
“You knew?”
“I received Victor's video.”
“Victor?”
There was genuine shock in his voice.
I closed my eyes.
“Matthias, I need one thing from you.”
“Anything.”
“Account 712.”
“What about it?”
“Can you move the money?”
“Yes.”
“All of it?”
A pause.
“With two board authorizations.”
“Whose?”
“Mine and my father's.”
Richard was unavailable.
Unless—
“Can Victor authorize it?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Gabriel was already understanding my idea.
Victor wanted control.
Evidence mattered because evidence threatened money and power.
So we would threaten both.
“Freeze the account.”
Matthias hesitated.
“Serena—”
“Freeze it. Flag every recipient, every shell company, every transfer request. Send copies to federal investigators and three independent law firms.”
“That could destroy Dre Holdings.”
“Then maybe Dre Holdings shouldn't survive.”
Silence.
I waited to see which Matthias would answer.
The husband?
Or the heir?
Finally he said:
“Tell me where to send everything.”
For the first time that night, I felt something toward him that wasn't anger.
Not forgiveness.
Not yet.
But recognition.
Maybe the man I married still existed somewhere.
Gabriel looked at the clock.
10:02.
“We have less than two hours.”
I rested both hands over my daughter.
“Then we make Victor believe he's getting exactly what he wants.”
Fiona looked at me.
“And what does he get?”
I stood.
“A nurse who spent nine years watching arrogant men underestimate women in emergencies.”
Gabriel opened the diner door.
Cold air rushed inside.
I followed him toward the waiting vehicle.
Behind us, Fiona called my name.
I turned.
She removed something from her pocket.
A key card.
“Hensley research building,” she said. “Executive elevator.”
I took it.
May you like
Then she added quietly:
“There's a room Victor never put on the floor plans.”
