Talbot raises an eyebrow.
"I stay with him." Bane's voice doesn't waver. "Drug me. Blindfold me. Restrain me. I don't care. But he is not spending another night alone while we deliberate over shipping routes."
Silence.
Zero stares at Bane. I stare at Bane. The associate tilts his head—clinical interest, like watching a lab result he didn't predict.
"You're offering yourself as collateral," Talbot says.
"I'm offering to keep my stepbrother company."
Talbot studies him. The warm smile is gone. In its place, something genuine—not warmth, not kindness. Curiosity.
"You'd put yourself in my hands. Voluntarily. For a stepbrother."
Bane holds his gaze. "Yes."
Long pause. Talbot swirls his wine. The room holds its breath.
"Very well." He sets down the glass. "You'll be sedated for transport. Blindfolded throughout. Confined to a single room. Any violation and I'll consider negotiations terminated—along with your brother's safety."
He looks at me. "Forty-eight hours, Mr. Graves."
Behind the glass, Max’s shoulders shudder on a sob. Talbot reaches for the remote. Presses the button. The wall goes dark.
I look at Bane.
The anger hits first. Not at Bane—at myself. Because it should have been me. It should have been my voice saying those words, my body offered as collateral, and instead I sat here running numbers and playing chess while my youngest brother did the thing I couldn't bring myself to do. He saw Max on that cross and didn't calculate. Didn't strategize.
Just moved.
And now Kline has two of us.
The realization settles like a stone in my gut. Bane just handed Talbot a second hostage. Any breach, any rescue attempt, any military option we had—gone. If we move on the facility, Kline doesn't just hold Max. He holds a Graves brother. Our leverage didn't double. It evaporated.
My youngest brother. Twenty-four years old. And he just outplayed us all—including himself.
"Bane—"
"Don't." He stands. Buttons his jacket. His hands are steady. His eyes are not. "Forty-eight hours. Get us out. Both of us."
He turns to Talbot's associate. "I'm ready."
I watch my brother walk away with the enemy, security tight on his heels. His shoulders squared. His spine straight. Not looking back.
Zero sits beside me. His arms are free now—the security men have released him. His fists are clenched on the table, blood seeping from knuckles he split against something during the struggle. He doesn't speak. Neither do I.
Talbot stands. Adjusts his cuffs. The associate gathers his leather-bound pad and both ready to leave.
At the door, Talbot pauses. Turns back.
"For what it's worth," he says, "I do admire the devotion. Most families would have sent a lawyer." His eyes move betweenus—Zero's bloody knuckles, my locked jaw, the empty chair where Bane sat. "Then again, most families don't look at their stepbrother the way you three do."
He smiles. Warm. Pleasant.
My blood boils.
"Forty-eight hours, gentlemen. Do give Richard my regards."
