Chapter 142 - The Hostage in Plain Sight
The room went dead silent, save for the ticking of an antique grandfather clock in the corner.
The four armed guards surrounding Ethan immediately raised their suppressed sidearms, red laser dots snapping onto the chest of his midnight-blue suit.
"You take one more step toward Lord Sterling, Vance, and we paint these silk walls with your blood," the lead guard barked.
Ethan didn't look at the guns. He slowly reached inside his tailored jacket.
The guards tensed, fingers twitching on their triggers.
Ethan pulled out a sleek, flat black ceramic remote detonator—the identical unit Noah had used at the lake, but modified with an encrypted satellite link.
"Do you know what this is, Charles?" Ethan asked calmly.
Sterling’s breath hitched. "A bomb? You brought an explosive into a luxury Swiss hotel? The security scanners at the lobby—"
"The security scanners at the lobby check for metallic compounds and nitrogen nitrates," Ethan explained, holding the thumb-switch steady. "They don't check for liquid thermal gel concealed inside the pressurized pneumatic suspension system of your own private elevator."
Sterling scrambled backward into his velvet chair, his eyes bulging with horror. "You rigged my elevator?!"
"I rigged the shaft sixty minutes ago while your guards were watching my press conference on the lobby monitors," Ethan said, his voice dropping into that terrifying, subterranean register that made men pray. "Ten pounds of C-4, wired to a dead-man's switch on this frequency. If my pulse stops, or if you attempt to leave this room before 0900... the entire forty-story core of this building collapses into the basement."
The four guards looked at each other, their hands beginning to tremble on their weapons.
"You're a madman," Sterling wept, the aristocratic titan reduced to a quivering coward. "You would die in this room just to stop me?!"
"I died ten years ago, Charles," Ethan whispered, his eyes blazing with an unholy, ancient fire. "When Dominic stole my children from that convent. Everything you see standing before you tonight... is just a ghost making sure the monsters don't touch his family."
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He pulled out an antique leather chair, turned it around, and sat down facing the four armed mercenaries, resting his forearms against the wooden backrest, the detonator resting lightly in his fingers.
"Sit down, gentlemen," Ethan commanded. "We have six hours until the European banking markets open. Let’s see who runs out of patience first."
