Chapter 17 - Marcus Hale Had Been Paid to Watch Damian, Not Betray Him

Damian did not confront Marcus immediately.

That was growth.

Or exhaustion.

Maybe both.

The payment list showed Marcus Hale receiving quarterly deposits from a Price-linked entity for six years.

Same amount.

Twenty thousand dollars.

No description.

No obvious invoice.

Damian stared at the screen until the letters lost shape.

Marcus had driven him through ambushes.

Slept in chairs outside hospitals.

Taken bullets for Cross men who outranked him.

Stayed with Elena’s clinic when Damian trusted no one else.

And apparently collected money from Samuel’s network.

Elena studied the records remotely.

“Ask before you decide.”

Damian looked at her.

“You enjoy saying that now.”

“Yes.”

Marcus stood outside the room.

Damian called him in.

Vivienne remained.

So did an investigator because the laptop was evidence now, not Cross property.

That changed the conversation.

Marcus saw his name on the screen.

He closed his eyes.

Not shock.

Recognition.

Damian’s stomach turned.

“How long?”

“Six years.”

“What for?”

Marcus looked at the investigator.

Then Damian.

“To report whether you were becoming Vincent.”

Silence.

Damian thought he had misheard.

“What?”

Marcus exhaled.

“The payments came from Malcolm.”

Vivienne stood.

“My father?”

“Yes.”

“Through Price accounts?”

“He controlled one legacy channel secretly.”

Vivienne stared.

Marcus continued.

“Six years ago, Malcolm approached me after a dock negotiation. Said the trust was still compromised. Said Samuel was positioning people around you.”

“And he paid you to spy.”

“To watch.”

“Difference?”

“I never gave him routes, money, crews, or private operations.”

“What did you give?”

Marcus swallowed.

“Behavior.”

The word offended Damian more than logistics.

“What behavior?”

“When you became reckless. When Samuel gained influence. Whether you were using the old trust contacts. Whether you started acting like Vincent.”

Vivienne’s face tightened.

“My father built an evaluation around Damian?”

“Yes.”

Damian laughed once.

“Everyone in this city has apparently been grading me.”

Marcus did not smile.

“Malcolm believed if you became like your father, Cross and Ashworth would start the old cycle again.”

“So he hired my driver.”

“You hired me after.”

That stopped him.

“You came to me because Malcolm placed you.”

“Yes.”

Betrayal arrived with precision.

Every late-night drive.

Every joke.

Every silent act of loyalty now had a second origin.

Damian’s hand closed around the back of a chair.

“Why stay after you stopped reporting?”

Marcus looked at him.

“Because I stopped believing Malcolm understood you better than I did.”

“When?”

“Three years ago.”

“The payments continued.”

“I put them in an account untouched.”

“Why?”

“Because refusing would tell him I was out.”

“Convenient.”

“Yes.”

Marcus did not defend himself further.

The investigator asked whether the funds remained traceable.

Marcus provided the account immediately.

Full balance.

No withdrawals.

That mattered.

It did not erase deception.

Vivienne sat slowly.

“My father used everyone.”

Marcus looked at her.

“He thought he was preventing war.”

“So did half the people who caused one,” Elena said through the screen.

The investigator took a formal statement.

Marcus admitted everything.

No operational crimes.

No evidence he helped Samuel.

If anything, his reports to Malcolm occasionally warned that Samuel had too much access.

One report from four years earlier read:

Damian listens to Samuel when angry. That is the risk.

Damian hated its accuracy.

After the interview, Marcus waited.

“For what?” Damian asked.

“You decide.”

“No.”

Marcus frowned.

“You decide.”

“I’m not your judge.”

“You’re my boss.”

“That is ending.”

Marcus absorbed it.

“Understood.”

“You lied to me for six years.”

“Yes.”

“You also saved my life more than once.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know what to do with both.”

Marcus’s face softened.

“You don’t have to tonight.”

Elena had infected everyone.

Damian almost smiled.

“Take leave.”

“How long?”

“Until I stop wanting to break your jaw.”

“Reasonable.”

Marcus moved toward the door.

“Marcus.”

He turned.

“Why did Malcolm care whether I became Vincent?”

Marcus hesitated.

“Because he believed Vincent and Samuel created Price’s network together before Vincent tried to leave.”

“That’s not what Celeste said.”

“No.”

“Who is right?”

“I don’t know.”

There it was again.

No clean history.

The next morning, Peter Vale woke after surgery.

He confirmed Marcus’s arrangement.

Malcolm had recruited him, not Samuel.

Vale also revealed Malcolm’s final plan.

Dissolve the trust.

Expose current payments.

Force both Cross and Ashworth into legitimate corporate structures over time.

Damian laughed when he heard that.

“Malcolm wanted to make us respectable?”

Vale grimaced.

“He wanted your children not to inherit the same war.”

Damian had no children.

Vivienne did not either.

Elena, however, heard the sentence.

“Maybe he meant successors, not literal children.”

Damian looked at her.

“You correcting dead men now?”

“Someone has to.”

Then Vale mentioned another file on Samuel’s laptop.

A scheduled payment.

Large.

Due that evening.

Recipient:

S. CROSS.

Damian stared.

Samuel paying himself made no sense.

Elena noticed first.

“S could be someone else.”

“How many Crosses are left?”

Damian thought.

Uncles dead.

Cousins scattered.

One aunt in Europe.

Then he remembered.

Sofia Cross.

His father’s older sister.

Seventy-four.

Retired nun.

Had not spoken to the family in twenty years.

Samuel’s payment note contained one line:

Release upon presentation of original recording.

The cassette.

Celeste’s confession.

Samuel had not only wanted the ledger.

He wanted proof that Celeste killed Vincent.

Not for revenge.

For Sofia.

Because Vincent’s sister controlled something no trust document mentioned.

The Cross family’s private voting shares.

If Samuel convinced Sofia that Celeste murdered Vincent and Damian protected her, he could challenge Damian’s legitimacy inside Cross holdings.

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The trust was frozen.

So Samuel had moved to the company itself.