Chapter 4 - The Digital Ghost
"Check the terminal," Alexander ordered, his voice dropping into a register so cold it made the hair on my arms stand up.
Marcus shoved the captive gunman into the hands of the secondary guards and rushed to the sleek wall-mounted console behind the desk. His fingers flew across the mechanical keyboard, tapping commands with frantic speed.
"Boss," Marcus said, his voice tight. "The firewall hasn't been breached from the outside. The download happened locally. Using the master terminal right here in this room."
Alexander slowly turned his head to look at me. The accusation in his eyes wasn't loud, but it was absolute.
"I was standing right beside you," I said defensively, stepping forward. "I haven't touched a computer keyboard all night."
"The master terminal requires two-factor authentication," Alexander said, his tone dangerously measured. "A biometric scan and a physical security key. The biometric scanner was bypassed using an administrative override token." He paused, his eyes narrowing. "A token that was only issued to two people in this entire building: myself... and my chief financial officer, Julian Vance."
My breath hitched. Julian Vance. The immaculately dressed man who had walked beside Victoria Lane earlier that evening, smiling politely as she humiliated me by the champagne tower.
"Julian," Marcus muttered, disbelief coloring his rough voice. "He's been with the family for ten years. He handled the shipping expansion into Europe."
"Julian is a ghost," Alexander said, walking over to the window and looking down at the empty street below where a black sedan was pulling away from the curb. "Or rather, he was a Volkov operative planted in my company five years ago, waiting for the exact moment our defenses were stretched thin."
I crossed my arms, feeling the cold air circulating from the open ventilation grate. "If he downloaded the master shipping ledger, he doesn't just have your financial records. He has the transport manifests for every asset your family moves across the East Coast. If the authorities—or rival syndicates—get a hold of those manifests, your entire empire collapses within forty-eight hours."
"Worse than that," Alexander said, turning back from the glass. "The ledger contains the security clearance codes for the private warehouse in Red Hook where we store millions in imported cargo belonging to our partners. If Volkov hits that warehouse tomorrow morning, it triggers a turf war that will turn Manhattan into a war zone."
Marcus looked between Alexander and me. "Boss, we need to track Julian down before he reaches Volkov's safehouse in Brooklyn. If we mobilize the street teams now—"
"No," Alexander interrupted. "Julian is too smart for a direct street intercept. He’ll have a convoy, encrypted comms, and backup waiting. If we move openly, we play right into their hands."
I stared at the unconscious intruder lying on the Persian rug. Something about the man's posture—the way his boots were caked with coarse gray sand rather than city asphalt—bothered me. It didn't match the profile of standard Manhattan mercenaries.
"Wait," I said, stepping closer to the captive. I knelt beside him and nudged his boot with my toe.
"What are you looking at?" Marcus asked.
"Look at the mud on his soles," I pointed out. "It's coarse silica sand mixed with maritime salt. You don't get that in Manhattan or Brooklyn. That specific consistency is only found at the abandoned naval shipyard in Montauk."
Alexander paused, his eyes sharpening as he looked down at me. "Montauk. The old federal dry docks."
"Julian didn't download the ledger to sell it to Volkov in the city," I said, the pieces clicking together in my mind with sudden, startling clarity. "He downloaded it to hand over the physical hardware keys at an offshore transfer point. And if my father's old files taught me anything about how these syndicates operate, an offshore transfer always happens at high tide."
Alexander checked his luxury wristwatch. The digital display glowed in the dim office light.
May you like
"High tide is at 3:15 AM," Alexander said, his jaw clenching. "Which gives us exactly four hours to intercept Julian Vance before he boards that freighter."
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