Chapter 198
Marcus’s POV
The Secaucus warehouse was also empty.
Marcus knew it before he even got out of the car. The building was too dark, too quiet, the kind of abandoned that came from months of disuse rather than hours.
“It’s another trap,” Dante said from the passenger seat, staring at his laptop. “The camera feeds I hacked into, they’re on a loop. He wanted us to see what he wanted us to see.”
Marcus slammed his fist against the steering wheel hard enough that pain shot up his arm. “Where is he? Where the hell did he take them?”
His phone buzzed. Another text from Julius.
Getting warmer. But not quite there yet. One more chance, Marcus. Make it count.
“I’m going to kill him,” Marcus said quietly. “When I find him I’m going to kill him with my bare hands.”
Mimi leaned forward from the back seat. “We need to think. Julius is playing games but there has to be a pattern. Three warehouses, all Wellington properties. What else does he own that fits?”
Dante was already pulling up property records. “There’s a storage facility in Bayonne, a shipping depot in Elizabeth, and wait, there’s something else. A marina. Small private dock registered to Wellington Enterprises in Weehawken.”
“A marina.” Marcus felt something click into place. “Water access. He could have a boat ready, a way to escape once he gets what he wants.”
“The address is 47 Harbor Road. It’s fifteen minutes from here.”
Marcus was already driving before Dante finished the sentence. He pushed the car past eighty on the turnpike, weaving through traffic while Mimi made calls to Detective Rivera updating him on the new location.
“Police are ten minutes behind us,” Mimi said. “Rivera says to wait for backup before approaching.”
“We’re not waiting for anything.”
“Marcus-”
“My wife and children are with a psychopath who’s already proven he’ll hurt them. I’m not sitting in a parking lot while he does God knows what waiting for cops to get permission to move.”
Dante’s laptop chimed. “I’m getting a signal. Elara’s phone, the one she still had before the van. It just came back online.”
“Where?”
“The marina. She’s there, Marcus. Or at least her phone is.”
Marcus pushed the car even faster. The marina came into view, a rundown collection of docks and storage sheds along the Hudson River. Most of the slips were empty, boats pulled for the winter, leaving the area feeling desolate and exposed.
And there at the end of the longest dock sat a sleek cabin cruiser with its engine running.
Julius stood on the deck holding Catherine in one arm. Alexander cried from a car seat on the deck beside him. And Elara sat tied to a chair near the boat’s controls, her face bruised and her eyes wide with fear.
Marcus felt his heart stop.
“Oh God,” Mimi breathed. “He actually has them all.”
Marcus parked and got out slowly, hands visible, trying not to spook Julius into doing something irreversible. Dante followed with his laptop and Mimi stayed close behind.
They walked onto the dock and Marcus could see more details now. Julius looked different than he had in Santorini or at the art auction. His expression was harder, colder, the charming facade completely gone.
“Marcus!” Elara called out. “Don’t come any closer, he has a gun!”
Marcus stopped about twenty feet from the boat. “Let them go, Julius. This is between you and me.”
“Is it though?” Julius shifted Catherine in his arms and the baby started crying. “Because from where I’m standing, this is about what you took from my sister. And the best way to make you understand that pain is to take something from you.”
“I didn’t take anything from Aurora. She made her own choices.”
“You broke her heart! You were supposed to marry her, supposed to give her the life she deserved. Instead you discarded her like she was nothing.”
“That’s not what happened and you know it. Aurora cheated on me years before I even met Elara.”
Julius laughed bitterly. “And you couldn’t forgive that one mistake? You had to throw away everything you had together over one stupid night?”
“It wasn’t one night, it was a pattern. Aurora lied about where she was, who she was with, what she was doing. The cheating was just the final straw.”
“So you moved on and found your perfect replacement. How nice for you.” Julius looked down at Catherine who was still crying in his arms. “She’s beautiful, Marcus. Your daughter. She has your eyes.”
“Please don’t hurt her. She’s innocent in all of this.”
“So was Aurora. She didn’t deserve to have her entire life destroyed because you couldn’t forgive her.”
Marcus took a step forward. “What do you want? You said you wanted money but you made Elara throw most of it away. So what is this really about?”
“It’s about making you suffer the way my sister suffered. It’s about watching you lose everything that matters while I walk away free.”
Then take me. Let Elara and the twins go and you can do whatever you want to me.”
16:10 Thu, May 14
Chapter 198
15
“That’s very noble but also very stupid. You’re not what I want, Marcus. You’re just a means to an end.”
Dante was typing quietly on his laptop, probably trying to contact the police or track something. Marcus needed to keep Julius talking, buy time for backup to arrive.
“How long have you been planning this?” Marcus asked.
“Since Santorini. I saw Elara there and I saw an opportunity. Beautiful, married to the man who destroyed my sister’s life. It was perfect.”
“I’ve been planning to hurt you however I could. The twins were just convenient timing.”
Elara was struggling against her restraints, trying to get free. “Julius, please. You made your point. You’ve terrified us, you’ve taken our children, you’ve won. Just let us go.”
“I haven’t won anything yet.” Julius walked to the edge of the boat, still holding Catherine. “But I’m about
to.”
He held the baby out over the water.
Catherine’s cries intensified as the cold air hit her face. Marcus felt his entire world narrow to that one moment, his daughter dangling over the Hudson River in the arms of a madman.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Julius said. “You’re going to give me whatever money you have left. Then you’re going to stand there and watch me leave with your wife and children. And if you try to follow me or call the police or do anything except exactly what I say, I drop this baby in the water and let her sink.”
Marcus’s hands were shaking. “I don’t have the money. Elara threw it all in the river like you told her to.”
“Then I guess you better figure something out fast. Because my arm is getting tired and I’d hate for something tragic to happen.”
Catherine was screaming now, her little face red and terrified. Marcus could see Elara sobbing, straining against the zip ties holding her to the chair.
“Wait!” Marcus pulled out his phone. “I can transfer money. Wire it wherever you want. Just pull her back from the edge.”
“How much can you transfer right now?”
“Five million. Maybe ten if I liquidate some assets.”
“That’s not twenty million.”
“It’s what I can get in the next five minutes! Please, just don’t drop her!”
Julius considered this, still holding Catherine over the water. The baby’s cries were getting weaker, more desperate.
“Fine. Transfer five million to this account.” Julius rattled off numbers that Marcus typed into his banking app with shaking fingers.
Done The transfer is processing. Now pull my daughter back.”
16:10 Thu, May 14
Chapter 198
Julius pulled Catherine back slightly but didn’t hand her over. “That was a good start. Now here’s what happens next. You and your friends get off this dock and go back to your car. Elara stays with me along with the twins. When I’m safely away, I’ll tell you where to find them.”
“That wasn’t the deal!”
“The deal is whatever I say it is. Now get off my dock before I change my mind about keeping this baby alive.”
Marcus felt Dante’s hand on his arm. “We need to fall back. Let the police handle this.”
“I’m not leaving them!”
“You don’t have a choice. He’s going to kill Catherine if you don’t back off.”
Marcus looked at Elara who was shaking her head desperately, mouthing something he couldn’t quite make out. Then he looked at his daughter still crying in Julius’s arms, her little hands reaching toward nothing.
He took a step backward.
Julius smiled. “That’s better. Now keep going. All the way back to your car.”
“Marcus, don’t!” Elara screamed. “Don’t leave us with him!”
But Marcus kept backing up, Dante and Mimi on either side of him, moving slowly down the dock toward shore.
They’d almost reached the parking lot when Julius’s phone rang.
He answered it still holding Catherine, listened for a moment, then looked at Marcus with an expression of pure rage.
“You called the police. I can see them coming up Harbor Road.”
“I didn’t-”
“You’re lying!” Julius raised Catherine higher. “You know what? I changed my mind about the deal.”
And he held Marcus’s daughter out over the water again.
“Give me the remaining money,” Julius said, his voice cold and flat. “Or I drop her in the water.”
