Chapter 6 - The Glass Castle Shatters
A gunshot echoed through the junkyard, deafening and brutal in the cold night air.
Elara screamed as Arthur stumbled backward, clutching his shoulder. Blood blossomed across his crisp white shirt, but he didn't fall. With a furious roar, Arthur tackled the security guard into the mud. The two men grappled desperately, but Arthur, fueled by years of repressed guilt and the primal urge to protect his child, grabbed a heavy iron wrench from the ground and brought it down hard on the guard's helmet.
The man went limp.
Arthur collapsed onto his knees in the mud, panting heavily, clutching his bleeding shoulder.
"Dad!" Elara cried, pushing her wheelchair toward him frantically.
"I'm okay. It went through the meat of my shoulder," Arthur gritted his teeth, his face pale with shock. He looked up at her, tears mixing with the rain on his face. "I'm so sorry, Elara. God, I am so sorry."
"We have to help Leo!" Elara shouted, pointing toward the front of the yard.
Arthur scrambled to his feet, ignoring the searing pain, and helped Elara push her chair toward the boy. Leo was lying unconscious in a puddle, his skin dangerously cold, the golden light completely faded from his body.
"We need to get him to a hospital," Arthur said, scooping the fragile boy into his arms. "My car is wrecked, but the security SUV is still running."
An hour later, they were in the emergency room of Manhattan General. Doctors swarmed Leo, hooking him up to IVs and monitors, bewildered by his profound exhaustion and hypothermia.
Arthur sat in the waiting room, his arm in a makeshift sling, while Elara sat beside him in her wheelchair, clutching the USB drive to her chest.
"What happens now?" Elara asked quietly, staring at the sterile white floor.
Arthur pulled out his phone. He didn't call his lawyers. He didn't call his PR team. He dialed the direct line of the New York District Attorney.
"Now," Arthur said, his voice finally steady, "we burn the castle down."
---
The next morning, the financial world awoke to a seismic shockwave.
Victoria Sterling, dressed in a stunning Chanel suit, was sipping mimosas in the solarium of the Hamptons estate, confident that her fixers had handled the problem. She was in the middle of drafting a press release regarding her husband's "sudden mental breakdown" when the front doors of the mansion were blown open.
Dozens of FBI agents and state police poured into the house.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Victoria screeched, dropping her champagne flute as an agent grabbed her arm.
"Victoria Sterling, you are under arrest for vehicular manslaughter, attempted murder, conspiracy, and obstruction of justice," the lead detective stated coldly, snapping handcuffs onto her wrists.
"This is absurd! My husband will sue you into the stone age!" she shrieked, kicking and fighting as they dragged her out.
Standing on the front porch, flanked by police, was Arthur. He watched his wife being shoved into the back of a squad car. He didn't feel an ounce of pity.
"Arthur! Do something!" she screamed through the glass.
Arthur simply turned his back on her and walked away. The USB drive had been delivered to the police. The dashcam footage showed Victoria’s face clearly behind the wheel as she struck the horse, followed by audio of her frantically calling Arthur to orchestrate the cover-up.
It was airtight. Victoria’s reign of terror was over.
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But Arthur knew his own reckoning was just beginning. He walked over to the lead detective and held out his hands.
"I'm ready to make my confession," Arthur said quietly.
