My Husband Announced Our Divorce in Front of 300 Wealthy Guests and Introduced His Mistress as His Future Wife—Then I Signed One Name That Made His Mother’s Smile Disappear. / Chapter 74 / 130

Chapter 74 - The Pariah's Last Bullet

Before Julian could react, a sudden burst of automatic gunfire tore through the corridor behind him.

Julian spun, firing two suppressed shots into the haze, dropping the first private contractor who had breached the outer ring of the *Leviathan*. But behind the smoke, two more figures advanced, wearing unmarked black combat gear with the emblem of the three-headed serpent stitched in silver thread across their plate carriers.

"Security team from the aft torpedo deck!" Julian shouted, grabbing my arm and pulling me behind the cover of the central command table. "They were sleeper cells embedded in the crew!"

Richards Vance's voice suddenly echoed from the aft corridor—hysterical, broken, yet dripping with a manic, vengeful delight.

"Eleanor! Eleanor, where are you, you arrogant bitch?!"

Richard stumbled into view through the smoking doorway, his hands unbound, clutching a service pistol he had evidently looted from a fallen crewman. His designer tuxedo was soaked in hydraulic grease and soot; his face was gaunt, his eyes bloodshot and dilated with sheer, unadulterated madness. Victoria’s ruin in New York, his own public bankruptcy, the humiliation of being dragged across the North Sea like cattle—it had burned away the last vestige of his sanity.

"Richard, drop the weapon!" Julian barked, leaning out from behind the console and firing a warning shot that took a chunk out of the steel doorframe inches from Richard's head.

Richard didn't duck. He barely seemed to notice. His eyes were locked on me, his breathing ragged. "You took everything! My family, my firm, my mother’s name! You left me with nothing! But they told me... the men in the black gear told me if I brought you to the airlock, I get my life back! I get Vance Capital back!"

Alistair, still on the floor, let out a dry, mocking laugh. "Look at him. The scion of Vance. A rabid dog begging for scraps at the slaughterhouse."

"Shut up!" Richard screamed, pointing his trembling gun at my father. "Shut up, old man! You’re the one who sold her out! You sold your own daughter to them!"

"Richard," I said, stepping slowly out from behind Julian’s cover before he could pull me back. My voice was calm, cutting through the gunfire and the sirens like a blade through silk. "Look at him. Look at the men behind you. Do you honestly believe they are going to hand you a wire transfer when this vessel docks? You are a loose end. You were always a loose end."

"You’re lying!" Richard shrieked, his finger tightening on the trigger. "You always think you’re the smartest person in the room! But you're in the dark now, Eleanor! We’re all dying down here!"

He raised the barrel directly toward my chest.

A single shot rang out—not from Julian’s weapon, and not from Richard’s.

Richard’s eyes went wide. A small, neat red puncture appeared in the center of his forehead. The manic light in his eyes vanished instantly, replaced by a vacant, hollow stare. The gun slipped from his fingers, clattering onto the steel deck, and Richard Vance collapsed forward into the pool of coolant, his face landing in the shadow of the Whitaker family crest.