Chapter 19
The structural integrity of the glass compromised, Clara hurled her own body weight against the pane. The glass shattered outward in a spectacular explosion of crystalline shards, sending Volkov stumbling backward. Clara rolled out of the enclosure just as the progress bar hit one hundred percent.
The server sparked, hissed, and then self-immolated as the internal thermite charges—triggered by the total data wipe—ignited, melting the hardware into a useless pool of glowing slag.
Volkov roared in fury, raising his weapon, but Elias dropped from the balcony, landing heavily on the marble floor and driving his boot squarely into Volkov’s chest. The financier flew backward, crashing through a wooden antique table and lying still in the wreckage.
"Time to go!" Elias grabbed Clara by the arm, hauling her to her feet. Sirens were wailing in the distance. The Swiss authorities were finally responding to the gunfire.
They sprinted toward the rear of the estate, blowing through the reinforced kitchen doors and out into the freezing night air of the sprawling gardens. The extraction point was the boathouse, where a secondary submersible sled was hidden.
Tracers lit up the darkness around them as the surviving estate guards fired blindly into the gardens. Elias took a grazing shot to the thigh, stumbling, but Clara caught him, throwing his heavy arm over her shoulder.
"Keep moving, soldier," Clara grunted, bearing his immense weight as they hobbled toward the water's edge. "You are not dying in a billionaire's garden."
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They reached the boathouse, plunging back into the freezing water. Clara activated the submersible sled. The quiet hum of the electric motor was the sweetest sound she had ever heard.
As they descended beneath the black surface of the lake, leaving the burning, chaotic ruin of the Montreux Estate behind, Clara looked back one last time. The Velvet Frontline had been decapitated. The buyers were bankrupt, their networks erased, their leaders dead or exposed. They had tried to steal a weapon to rule the world, and instead, they had invited a mother's wrath.
