Chapter 193
Chapter 193
Dallas’s face went instantly livid. “What? There’s a vault in the wall behind me?”
“Yes,” Sylvia replied calmly. “Check it yourself.”
Dallas looked like he didn’t buy it. Furious, he yanked Zack up off the ground. “Quit messing with me.”
Terrified, Zack wailed even louder, thrashing desperately in Dallas’s grip.
Joanna sneered. “Sylvia, why provoke him now? Do you even care about Zack?”
Byron also grew tense, fearing Sylvia might provoke the kidnapper and make things worse. “Stay quiet, Sylvia. Let me handle this.”
He snapped his fingers, and his men immediately hauled in several large cases containing the 16 million the kidnapper had demanded. “Put Zack down,” Byron commanded, his brows furrowing.
Dallas lowered Zack from overhead but kept a tight grip, sneering. “We agreed on 16 million before, but that’s not enough now.”
Byron’s brows stayed furrowed. “Then how much?”
Dallas didn’t answer right away. He glanced at Joanna. Joanna subtly flashed five fingers. Dallas nodded slightly and turned back. “50 million.”
Byron let out a cold laugh. “How are you even going to carry all that cash?”
Dallas’s face twisted into a vicious snarl. “That’s none of your damn business. If you want your son to live, you’ll pay 50 million dollars.”
Joanna secretly gloated. As long as they got the money, she was confident she could help Dallas spirit it away without anyone noticing. She thought, ‘The bigger the haul, the better.‘
Byron nodded without hesitation and turned to the suited man beside him. “Get 50 million. Immediately.”
Sylvia frowned and stepped up to Dallas. “Didn’t I just tell you? There’s a vault behind you. Why waste time trying to get cash?”
TeddyBot was hidden against the wall, silent. Its sensors had picked up a strong trace of metal. It had followed Zack and the kidnapper all the way here and had detected a large amount of gold inside.
Dallas had always thought Sylvia was just messing with him. But seeing her insist, he held Zack hostage, glanced warily at the wall behind him, and growled, “What if there’s nothing?”
Sylvia met his gaze unflinchingly. “Then do whatever you feel like.”
Dallas pulled Zack in front of him, reminding them he still had leverage. “You sure you want to bet on that?”
Sylvia’s voice remained rock steady. “Absolutely.”
Byron’s face darkened as he looked at Sylvia, his voice laced with gentle reproach. “Sylvia,” he said, “this is no time to joke around.”
Sylvia turned to meet Byron’s eyes. “Trust me,” she said firmly. With determined steps, she strode up to the wall and, without hesitation, delivered a powerful kick.
The already crumbling mud wall gave way with a thunderous crash, collapsing in a billowing cloud of dust. A cavernous space opened up inside. As the dust settled, it revealed row upon row of neatly stacked gold bars.
Bathed in sunlight, the gold bars gleamed with dazzling brilliance, stunning everyone into speechless awe in that instant.
Sylvia’s jaw dropped slightly in genuine astonishment–this was far beyond what she’d expected. The sheer quantity of gold bars here was staggering- well over a hundred gleaming bricks.
Joanna’s eyes instantly bulged with greed. ‘If only I’d found this place sooner,’ she thought. ‘All this gold could keep me–and my family—living in luxury for generations.’
She burned with envy again. ‘How on earth does Sylvia do it? First an oil field, now gold bars.’
Byron stared at the gold bars, his brows furrowing. Suddenly, a long–forgotten piece of history resurfaced in his mind.
There’d been a notorious outlaw about a hundred years ago who stashed a fortune somewhere around Silverton. No one ever found it. Turned out it’d been right here the whole time.
Dallas was utterly dumbstruck. He’d never expected Sylvia was actually telling the truth. His eyes instantly lit up with greed as he stared at the gold bars, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed hard.
Dallas instinctively released Zack and lunged for the wall, his greedy fingers clawing at the gold bars. Sylvia reacted instantly, plunging a needle straight into Dallas’s hand.
Dallas cried out in pain as the gold bar slipped from his grasp and clattered to the ground. With a furious roar, he whirled around and pounced at Sylvia.
Byron darted forward and shielded Sylvia with his body. Dallas swung a punch at Byron, who sidestepped with ease and countered with a sharp blow to his gut.
Dallas let out a sharp cry and staggered back a few steps before charging again. Byron’s guys moved in fast, surrounding him from all sides. Together, they pinned Dallas to the ground. Dallas thrashed hard, but in the end, he was down for good.
Joanna’s heart raced–after all, she was in cahoots with Dallas. She began sneaking backward, trying to slip away unnoticed.
Just then, Sylvia’s sharp voice cut through the air. “Joanna, where do you think you’re going?”
Joanna stammered nervously, “I need to use the restroom. My stomach’s killing me.”
Byron sensed something was off and gave his men a discreet signal. They immediately moved to tail Joanna.
“Mommy.” Zack sobbed as he ran toward Sylvia, his face streaked with tears. “I thought I’d never see you again.”
Sylvia’s heart ached at the sight of Zack’s pitiful face. Without hesitation, she rushed over and scooped him up from the ground, holding him tight.
Seeing Zack clinging to Sylvia and sobbing, Byron felt a pang of jealousy. He walked over and gently patted Zack on the back. “There, there. Daddy’s right here,” he said soothingly.
Zack peeked up at Byron, then buried his face back into Sylvia’s arms, still sobbing.
Byron didn’t look too happy, but there was no time for jealousy. He still had a score to settle.
His whole body practically radiated rage. He walked up and kicked Dallas–hard. Dallas weighed close to 200 pounds, but that kick sent him flying. Several of his ribs cracked on impact. “Who sent you?” Byron growled.
Dallas let out a cry of pain as the kick landed. He looked up, terror etched across his face, his voice trembling. “I… I don’t know what you’re talking
about.”
Sylvia strode over to Dallas, grabbed his phone, and checked his call history. Then, she reached into her bag, pulled out Joanna’s cell phone, and
powered it on.
When Joanna insisted on coming here, Sylvia had suspected her from the start. To prevent any information leaks, she forced Joanna to hand over her
phone and kept it in her own bag.
Sylvia dialed the last number Dallas had called. Instantly, Joanna’s phone began to ring. Dallas‘ face fell—he knew the jig was up.
Sylvia stared at him icily. “So it was really Joanna who put you up to this.”
Just then, a suited man rushed in breathlessly. “Mr. Blair, Joanna used the restroom as an excuse and ran off.”
