Chapter 9 - The Burning House
Through the haze of smoke and shattered glass, Tristan saw Marcus crawling toward the elevator, blood dripping from a gash on his temple. Julian was gone, having fled down the service stairs toward the roof.
Tristan walked over to Marcus, his boots crunching on the glass. He stood over his cousin, the gun pointed directly between Marcus’s eyes.
"Tristan... please," Marcus wheezed, holding up a bloody hand. "We're blood. Your father... he was going to ruin us. He was going to give it all to the feds. I did it for the family."
"My father died with his honor intact," Tristan said. "You're dying in a hotel room you didn't pay for."
BANG.
Tristan didn't look back as he ran toward the roof access door. The winter wind was howling outside, snow swirling across the helipad where a private Sikorsky chopper was already spinning its rotors.
Julian was there, clutching a leather briefcase, screaming at the pilot to lift off. The pilot, seeing Tristan emerge from the stairwell with a gun in his hand, cut the engines and raised his hands through the cockpit window.
"Julian!" Tristan shouted over the dying roar of the blades.
Julian turned, his face pale with terror, backing away until his heels hit the edge of the roof's concrete parapet. Thirty stories below, the city looked like a grid of tiny, indifferent lights.
"Don't shoot me, Tristan!" Julian screamed, tears freezing on his cheeks. "I'm your brother! You can't kill your own brother!"
Tristan lowered the Glock slightly. He looked at the boy who had shared his childhood, the boy he had protected from bullies in the streets of Brooklyn thirty years ago.
"I'm not going to kill you, Julian," Tristan said, his voice carrying over the wind. "The feds are downstairs. The Kanes know you lost their money. You have about ten minutes before you belong to them."
Tristan turned his back on his brother, walking back toward the stairs. Julian reached for a hidden weapon in his jacket, but his foot slipped on the patch of black ice coating the concrete ledge.
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A sharp, short cry cut through the wind.
Tristan didn't turn around until he heard the distant sound of metal twisting far below. When he looked back, the ledge was empty.
