Chapter 10 - The Vault Below
The red emergency strobes painted the mahogany walls of the study in rhythmic, pulsing arcs of crimson light.
"My father's master key?" I repeated, the words tasting like copper on my tongue. "My father has been dead for twelve years. His physical key was locked in the primary safe the day we buried him."
"Not physically, Dominic," Marco said, his fingers flying across the tactical laptop to isolate the basement feed. "The digital decryption key. The master root protocol embedded in the family trust’s legacy mainframe. Only three people in history ever possessed the biometric signature to authorize it: your father, yourself... and Julian."
The phone in my hand clicked, and a deep, gravelly voice answered from the other end of the line in heavily accented English. "Moretti. It’s been a long time. I thought you forgot how to dial this number."
"Viktor," I said, keeping my eyes fixed on the basement access monitor on Marco’s desk. "I need a tactical extraction team in Zurich, and I need every surveillance satellite you have eyes on directed at the Swiss banking district tonight."
Viktor let out a low, gravelly chuckle on the other end. "Always business with you, Dominic. What’s the play? Who are we burying?"
"My uncle," I replied coldly. "The man who supposedly died twelve years ago."
A sudden, sharp silence hung on the line, followed by the sound of Viktor exhaling a cloud of cigar smoke. "Ah. Julian. I wondered when you would figure out that old fox was still collecting rent in the Mediterranean. Send me the coordinates. My boys will clear the house before breakfast."
I hung up without another word and tossed the phone onto the desk.
Downstairs in the basement, the heavy pneumatic seals of the primary vault hissed open. The security feed showed the thick steel door slowly swinging outward into the dimly lit subterranean corridor, revealing a figure standing in the shadows just beyond the threshold.
It wasn't a tactical operative. It wasn't one of Marcus’s mercenaries.
The figure stepped forward into the dim amber light of the corridor camera, wearing an impeccably tailored charcoal suit, leaning slightly on an ebony walking cane with a silver wolf's head handle. His hair was stark white, combed back with meticulous precision, and a familiar, cold smile played across his weathered lips.
Julian Moretti looked up directly into the lens of the security camera, as if he could see straight through the monitor into my study.
"He's inside the house," Marco whispered, unholstering his Sig Sauer with a sharp click, his eyes fixed on the study door.
"Stay here," I instructed quietly, looking down at Clara, who had slipped her small, warm hand into mine without a word of fear. I knelt down, handing her over to Daniel. "Take her back into the panic room, Daniel. Lock the door and don't open it for anyone—not even me—unless you hear my voice saying your mother's name."
Clara looked up at me, her hazel eyes reflecting the pulsing red emergency lights. "You're going to find her, aren't you?"
May you like
"I am," I promised, pressing a soft kiss to the top of her dark curls. "Stay safe, Clara."
I straightened up, pulled my Beretta from its holster, checked the chamber with a crisp, fluid snap, and walked out of the study toward the grand staircase, leaving the red light of the burning house behind me as I descended into the dark to face the ghost who had stolen my world.
