Victoria gasped for air as Marcus held her firmly against the bright office wall.
The bright daylight exposed every line of terror written across her pale face.
Marcus leaned in close, his chest heaving with heavy breaths of pure adrenaline.
"You tried to poison me and silence a child?!" Marcus shouted right into her face.
Victoria tried to pull away, but his grip on her collar was like solid iron.
"Let me go, Marcus, you don't know what you are doing!" Victoria pleaded nervously.
"I know exactly what I am doing, you evil creature," Marcus answered back sharply.
He narrowed his eyes, pointing his thumb toward the smashed glass on the floor.
"That liquid was meant to cause a heart attack that looked like natural failure," he said.
Victoria swallowed hard, her confidence melting away under his fierce, dark stare.
She looked around the massive office, hoping someone from security would magically enter.
But the heavy wooden doors were locked tightly from the inside per her own instructions.
She had locked them herself so no one would interrupt her quiet murder scheme.
Now those locked doors meant no one could save her from an enraged father.
Lily watched from behind the heavy desk, wiping tears from her rosy cheeks.
"Daddy, she had a bottle of it in her bag too," Lily spoke up quietly.
Marcus glared even harder at the nurse pinned helpless against the white wall.
"Who hired you to put that chemical into my daily medication?" Marcus demanded angrily.
Victoria kept her lips pressed tightly together, refusing to say a single word.
She knew the people behind this plot were far more dangerous than Marcus Vance.
If she gave up their names, she knew she would never leave this city alive.
Marcus lowered his voice to a dangerous, icy whisper that chilled her to the bone.
"You have three seconds to speak before I ruin your life forever," Marcus warned.
"You can't do anything to me without real proof," Victoria tried to bluff back.
Marcus let out a dark laugh that echoed through the sunlit penthouse room.
He pointed up toward the heavy wooden ceiling beams near the American flag.
A tiny red camera lens glinted brightly in the natural sunlight right above them.