Chapter 72 - The Face Behind the Surveillance Feed
The subterranean vault beneath the Place de la Fusterie was built inside the bedrock beneath the Rhone River, designed in the nineteenth century to withstand artillery fire and financial collapse.
Water dripped rhythmically in the stone corridor as Khloe and I moved through the subterranean gloom. I carried a suppressed tactical pistol at the low ready; Khloe held Anthony's encrypted keycard, her eyes fixed on the reinforced steel door at the end of the hall marked: *VAULT 880-DELTA.*
The electronic lock was already disengaged, its green LED glowing softly in the shadows. The four-inch-thick vault door stood ajar by two inches.
Inside, the illumination was dim, cast only by a single banker’s lamp sitting on a long mahogany table surrounded by thousands of polished brass safe-deposit boxes.
Sitting at the center of the table, methodically stacking stacks of bearer bonds and bearer share certificates into an aluminum flight case, was Isabella.
She wore a cashmere turtleneck, her hair pulled back into a severe bun. On the table beside her rested a half-empty glass of vintage Merlot and a pearl-handled Beretta .32.
"You're late, Khloe," Isabella said without looking up, stamping a transfer document with Anthony's personal signet ring. "I expected you at least thirty minutes ago. Did you have trouble disposing of Catherine's wreckage?"
Khloe stepped into the vault, her weapon raised, leveled directly at her sister’s heart.
"You knew," Khloe said, her voice shaking with lethal restraint. "You knew Catherine had rigged the bridge. You knew she had the detonator."
Isabella slowly set down the signet ring and looked up. Her eyes were rimmed with dark circles, but there was no fear in them. Only the cold, calculating exhaustion of someone who had gambled everything on a single roll of the dice.
"Of course I knew," Isabella said smoothly. "Who do you think sold Catherine the military-grade C4 through the Serbian black market in Lyon? Who do you think leaked Anthony's flight plan to Zurich?"
"You tried to kill your own nephew," I growled, stepping past Khloe, my finger tightening on the trigger. "You tried to slaughter both babies on that mountain."
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Isabella let out a bitter, humorless laugh that echoed off the cold stone walls. "Kill them? Mark, you idiot. If I wanted those children dead, I would have injected potassium chloride into their IV bags in Boston before you ever walked onto that hospital floor."
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