The Ghost of Wall Street
Two miles away, a man climbed out of a manhole cover in the center of an alleyway near the Brooklyn Bridge.
He was a nightmare in silhouette. His left arm was tucked into a makeshift sling made of a shredded tactical vest. His face was a mask of dried blood and white stone dust.
Andrew Scott didn't look like a billionaire anymore. He looked like the monster the board had always feared he would become.
He walked toward a black sedan idling at the end of the alley. The driver, a man who had served as Andrew's private security for a decade—a man Andrew had paid double to stay loyal to him and him alone—stepped out, his eyes wide with shock.
"Mr. Scott? We thought... the news said—"
"The news is late," Andrew rasped, sliding into the driver's seat. "Give me your phone. And your weapon."
The driver obeyed without a word. Andrew looked at the GPS. He didn't head for Red Hook. He headed for the one place Victor Hale would be: the Scott Enterprises backup command center in Midtown.
Victor wouldn't be at the shipyard. He would be watching the "containment" on a monitor, sipping aged scotch, waiting for the confirmation that the last of the Patrick family was gone.
Andrew floored the accelerator.
The pain in his arm was a dull, thumping roar now, pushed back by adrenaline and a singular, burning purpose. He reached into the glove box and pulled out a clean shirt, throwing it over his bloodied sweater. He wiped his face with a rag.
He looked in the rearview mirror. His eyes were cold, dead things.
He dialed a number he had memorized years ago. A direct line to the Chairman of the Federal Reserve.
"This is Andrew Scott," he said into the phone as he tore through a red light. "The Origin files currently hitting the SEC servers are only the first half. If you want the names of the banks that laundered the political contributions, you're going to give me ten minutes of total silence on the Midtown police band."
"Andrew? We thought you were dead. You're under investigation for—"
"I'm the only man who can stop the market from hitting zero tomorrow morning," Andrew interrupted, his voice like grinding stones. "Ten minutes. Or the second half of the ledger goes to the public domain."
He hung up.
He pulled up to the glass-fronted command center. He didn't use his keycard. He didn't wait for the guards.
He drove the black sedan directly through the lobby's floor-to-ceiling glass windows.
The crash was a symphony of destruction. Glass rained down like diamonds. The guards scrambled, weapons drawn, but they froze when the driver stepped out of the wreckage.
Andrew Scott stood in the center of the lobby, surrounded by shards of his own empire.
"Tell Victor," Andrew said, his voice echoing through the vaulted space, "that his liability has arrived."