Chapter 13
The final betrayal came from the pool itself.
One of my bodyguards found a second panel inside the tunnel chamber.
Behind it was a narrow speaking tube running upward toward the patio.
Old construction.
My grandfather used it during emergencies to hear what was happening above without opening the escape route.
Someone had repaired it recently.
Conrad looked confused.
Diane did not.
I saw that.
“What did you use it for?”
She said nothing.
Marcus walked toward the wall.
Then he understood.
“You listened.”
Robert closed his eyes.
My brother looked at our mother.
“You listened to council dinners.”
The patio above the pool was where I held informal summer meetings with senior capos.
Not every detail.
Enough.
Diane had been hearing fragments through the old passage.
Then feeding what she learned to Marcus and Mercer.
That was how her pressure campaign stayed one step ahead of my moves.
Conrad swore.
“You told me Marcus had a source.”
Diane stared at him.
He laughed bitterly.
“You were the source.”
Again, nobody had received the whole truth.
I looked at Robert.
“You knew?”
“No.”
I believed him.
His shock was too immediate.
Diane finally spoke.
“You shut me out.”
There it was.
The justification behind everything.
“I spent thirty-five years inside Armstrong decisions, and then you took over and decided experience was inconvenient.”
“I removed you after you threatened two captains’ families.”
“They needed reminding.”
“No.”
My voice stayed quiet.
“They needed leadership.”
She stepped closer.
“You think because men obey you now, they love you?”
“I don’t need them to love me.”
That stopped her.
Diane had always needed emotional ownership in addition to obedience.
I continued.
“I need them to know what happens when they betray this family. I do not need their children hungry to prove it.”
Her face hardened.
“You’ll lose everything.”
Maybe.
But not that way.
Marcus reached into the tunnel and tore the repaired speaking tube free from the wall.
Diane stared at him.
He looked at her.
“You told me Liberty was paranoid.”
He dropped the metal pipe onto the concrete.
“You were listening to her inside her own house.”
Diane’s expression became almost wounded.
As if his disobedience betrayed her more than starving Amelia betrayed him.
That was when I knew her power was over.
May you like
Not because I had defeated her.
Because the people she trained to orbit her were finally beginning to recognize the gravity was manufactured.
