The wheelchair tipped violently over the edge, crashing down six feet onto the hardwood floor below. Pain exploded through my chest and ribs as the impact shattered my surgical bandages. I lay gasping on the floor, flat on my back, watching the ceiling lights spin in blur.
Grant scrambled over the edge of the stage, dropping down beside me like a predator. His eyes were wide with unhinged rage. He dropped his full weight onto my chest, pressing his knee directly against my broken ribs while his hand clamped tight over my mouth and nose.
“You ruined everything, you little bastard,” he hissed, his face inches from mine. He raised the syringe with his free hand, driving the needle toward my exposed neck. “They’ll think you died from trauma sustained in the fall.”
I couldn’t breathe. Dark spots danced across my vision as the weight on my chest cut off my oxygen entirely. My hands fumbled blindly on the floor beside me. My fingers brushed against a heavy metallic object that had fallen off the stage decor during the crash—a solid bronze memorial plaque.
With every ounce of strength remaining in my upper body, I swung the bronze plaque upward with all my might.
It struck Grant sharply against the side of his jaw. He let out a choked cry, his hold loosening as he stumbled backward onto the floor, clutching his bleeding face.
Before he could recover, heavy footsteps thundered across the hall.
Four uniformed officers from the Chicago Police Department stormed through the side entrance, firearms drawn. Behind them stood Samuel Price, holding his bruised jaw but pointing directly at Grant and Evelyn.
“Drop the weapon! Hands where we can see them!” the lead officer shouted.
Grant looked around wildly, realizing he was completely surrounded. The two thousand attendees were standing on their chairs, filming everything on their phones. There was no escape, no cover-up left to execute. The police slammed Grant face-down onto the floor, pulling his arms behind his back and snapping steel handcuffs around his wrists.
On stage, Evelyn tried to slip through the backstage curtain, but two officers blocked her path, arresting her immediately for conspiracy to commit murder and corporate fraud.
Samuel knelt beside me, placing a warm coat over my trembling shoulders. “You held on, Lucas. Your father would be proud.”
“The envelope…” I wheezed, my voice barely a whisper through the crushing chest pain. “Is it over?”
Samuel picked up the slate-gray envelope that had landed near us and opened it completely, pulling out the official state coroner’s report alongside a encrypted flash drive.
“Your father knew they were poisoning him months ago,” Samuel explained softly, his voice echoing in the quiet room as the paramedics rushed in with a gurney. “He feigned compliance to gather evidence and protected you by placing his entire enterprise into an irrevocable trust that locked automatically upon his death. The car crash was their desperate attempt to stop this exact moment, but Arthur built a trap they couldn’t escape.”
As the paramedics carefully lifted me onto the stretcher, I looked back one last time. Grant was being dragged away in chains, his arrogance completely shattered, staring at the floor in defeat. Evelyn was weeping hysterically as her mugshot was being taken right beside the stage.
For the first time in six months, I took a deep, clear breath. The physical pain in my body remained, but the terrifying nightmare was finally over. My father’s name was restored, his murderers were bound for prison, and I had taken back everything that belonged to us.
