Chapter 12 - The Ghost of the Syndicate
The encrypted text message sat on my phone screen like a ticking bomb. I handed the device to Adrian without a word. He looked at the photograph, his jaw clenching so hard muscles pulsed along his temples.
"They're already inside our perimeter," I said, my voice dangerously calm as I poured myself a cup of black coffee. "Whoever took this photo had a long-range telescopic lens positioned on the roof of the commercial building across the street—a building owned by Apex Logistics, a shell company tied directly to Victor Shaw's offshore network."
Adrian set the phone down on the counter and walked over to his secure terminal, tapping rapidly across multiple encrypted displays. Complex firewall maps and surveillance feeds illuminated his face in a harsh blue glow.
"Apex Logistics was liquidated three weeks ago when the federal asset freeze hit," Adrian said, his fingers flying across the mechanical keyboard. "Which means someone else just acquired their lease within the last forty-eight hours. Someone with deep pockets and zero desire to leave a paper trail."
"Who?" I asked, stepping up beside him.
"Kaelen Vance—no relation to the district attorney," Adrian muttered, bringing up a heavily redacted dossier on the screen. "A ghost investor based out of Geneva and Singapore. He specializes in hostile asset retrieval for international cartels and high-net-worth black-market syndicates. If he's in town, it means Celeste's trial is just a distraction from the real war."
My phone buzzed again. This time, it was an incoming audio file. I pressed play.
A raspy, distorted voice hissed through the penthouse speakers: <i>'Ms. Halden, congratulations on your promotion to CEO. But a throne built on borrowed shares doesn't stand long against an earthquake. Return the waterfront development deeds to Cross Meridian Capital—oh, excuse me, Mr. Cross's firm—or tomorrow morning, your corporate servers won't just leak financial data. They'll leak your father's autopsy report. The unredacted one.'</i>
My breath caught in my throat. My father's autopsy report. The official file that had been sealed by the county coroner the night of his crash—the one Celeste claimed had been destroyed in a fire.
"They have the real autopsy," I whispered, my hands trembling as I gripped the edge of the console. "The one that proves he didn't die of a heart attack before the crash... the one that proves he was poisoned with paralytic agents before his car went off the cliff."
Adrian turned off the audio file, his dark eyes burning with an incandescent rage I had never seen before. He pulled me into his arms, holding me so tightly I could feel the fierce, heavy beat of his heart against my chest.
"They want a war, Victoria?" Adrian whispered fiercely against my hair. "Then we'll give them a massacre. But first, we need to pay a visit to someone who can tell us exactly who Kaelen Vance answers to."
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"Who?" I asked, looking up into his dark eyes.
"Victor Shaw," Adrian replied with a cold, merciless smile. "He's currently sitting in federal holding waiting for arraignment. And unlike his corporate partners, Victor loves saving his own skin more than he loves protecting secrets."
