SLIP.
I laid the heavy titanium key flat across the nape of Arthur Sterling-Vance’s neck:
TINK.
“You hired Blake to kick my boy in the ribs two hours ago, Arthur,” Chancellor Damon Arthur Mercer whispered softly.
My voice had no trembling plumber's hesitation left.
It carried forty decibels of compressed, sub-zero polar diamond that made the falling drizzle itself seem to freeze in mid-air:
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“There is nobody in this room who can beat me.”
“You told yourself that seventy billion dollars in Swiss debt could overwrite eighty years of honest naval bedrock.”
I leaned down until my clear hazel eyes filled the former Chief Justice's entire field of vision:
“You were right about one thing, Arthur.”
“Nobody beat me.”
“The audit is complete.”
“And that little sparring match you paid for tonight...”
I tapped the titanium key against his collar:
“...just audited your entire seventy-billion-dollar dynasty into Fort Leavenworth.”
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