Chapter 4 - The House of Cards
Victor Vance froze for a fraction of a second, his eyes darting from Elias to the shattered safe, then to the photograph of his wife still resting in Elias's hand. But the mask of shock vanished as quickly as it had appeared, replaced by a cold, measured composure that was infinitely more terrifying than panic.
"Well," Victor said, taking a slow sip of his coffee. "I see we've skipped the pleasantries. I was wondering how long it would take you to check the books, boss."
Elias didn't move. He didn't draw a weapon, though I could see the muscles in his forearms strain against the cuffs of his shirt. The air between them crackled with a decade of shared history, trust, and now, utter ruination.
"Julian is gone," Elias said, his voice a lethal whisper. "And you're standing here holding coffee like you didn't just spend the last three years robbing me blind and letting dead men's families starve."
Victor let out a low, dry chuckle, shaking his head. "Robbing you? Elias, let's be entirely honest with each other. You built this empire on the backs of men like Daniel Hayes—men you treated like disposable tools. When Daniel died, did you mourn him? Really mourn him? No. You wrote a check, filed a report, and moved on to the next contract."
"He saved my life," Elias snarled, taking a step forward.
"And I kept your entire operation from collapsing while you were busy playing grieving patron," Victor shot back, his voice finally rising, stripped of its corporate polish. "You think Julian and I skimmed off the top out of greed? We took what was owed to us for keeping your blind loyalty from getting us all killed. But Daniel... Daniel was a loose end. He knew things about the North End shipment three years ago that he shouldn't have known."
My breath hitched. The room seemed to tilt on its axis.
"What are you talking about?" I demanded, stepping out from the shadow of the desk. "Daniel died in a fire."
Victor turned his cold, calculating gaze onto me, and for the first time, I saw the true monster behind his tailored suit.
"Did he?" Victor smiled thinly. "The official report said fire, yes. But the warehouse wasn't blown up by our rivals, Adeline. The charges were planted from the inside. Daniel discovered that the North End shipments weren't weapons or electronics—they were human trafficking routes that Elias’s own trusted board members were running behind his back. Daniel was going to expose it all."
Elias stopped dead in his tracks. The blood seemed to drain entirely from his face, leaving him looking older, grayer, and utterly shattered.
"That's a lie," Elias choked out. "My board... we don't touch trafficking."
"We didn't," Victor corrected smoothly. "Until Julian and I decided that your rigid code of honor was bad for business. Daniel found out. So we arranged a little accident. We just didn't count on him managing to drag your ungrateful carcass out of the fire before the roof caved in on him."
Victor casually set his coffee cup down on a side table and reached slowly inside his jacket.
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"And now," Victor continued, his smile turning feral, "you walk in here with a cleaner from the night shift, thinking you've uncovered a simple embezzlement scheme. You really should have stayed in the basement, Elias."
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