Chapter 4 - The Voice on the Landing
Daniel didn't drop his weapon. Instead, he rolled hard to the left, taking cover behind the reinforced balustrade of the staircase just as a burst of suppressed automatic gunfire chewed the marble pillar where he had stood a second before. Stone dust and splinters showered his hair.
"You're wasting your time, whoever you are," Daniel called out, his voice steady, carrying an icy edge that cut through the ringing in his ears. "You crossed my gates, but you're not walking back out of them."
"We'll see about that, Carter," the voice replied. It was synthesized, altered by a vocal scrambler, but beneath the mechanical distortion, there was a chilling familiarity to the cadence. It was the rhythm of someone who had spent years studying Daniel's business model, someone who knew how the syndicate's inner machinery worked.
A heavy boot hit the landing floor above. "We don't need you alive anymore. The council has voted. Your era of family sentimentality—spending your afternoons playing father to a dead auditor's daughter—has made you weak."
Daniel's grip on his rifle tightened. They knew about the park. They had been watching him watch Ethan. The realization sent a white-hot spike of rage through his chest, eclipsing even the tactical danger of his current position. They hadn't just targeted his business; they had used his own son against him as a tracking beacon.
"If the council wanted me dead," Daniel shouted back, edging slowly up the stairs, keeping his body low against the wall, "they wouldn't have sent desk-jockeys who talk too much."
He triggered a flashbang grenade from his tactical vest, pulled the pin, and tossed it blindly around the upper landing corner.
Clatter—flash—BOOM!
A blinding white magnesium flare turned night into daylight, accompanied by a concussive shockwave that rattled the antique paintings on the walls. A scream of disorientation echoed from above.
Daniel vaulted up the final steps, his rifle raised. The operative was stumbling backward, hands clutching his eyes, trying to clear his vision. Daniel didn't hesitate; he brought the butt of his rifle down hard on the man's collarbone, sending him crashing to the Persian carpet.
The hallway was empty. The intruder had slipped through the north gallery window, leaving behind only a rappelling rope swaying gently in the night breeze.
Daniel rushed back to the study. The panic room door was ajar.
Inside, Marcus was standing guard, and Ethan was sitting on a steel bench, pale as paper, clutching the crumpled shipping manifests to his chest.
"Are you hit?" Daniel demanded, grabbing his son by the shoulders, his eyes scanning him frantically for injuries.
"No," Ethan whispered, looking up at his father with eyes that were no longer those of a child. "Dad... they aren't after the dock records. They’re after the list of names. The names of the council members who paid off the judges twelve years ago."
Daniel stared at him. "How do you know that?"
Ethan reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, metallic flash drive—the one he had secretly pocketed from Lily before coming home. "Because Lily didn't just give me papers. She gave me the decryption key. And she told me something else."
Daniel's heart hammered against his ribs. "What?"
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"She said the person running the hit squad tonight isn't an outside rival," Ethan said, his voice dropping to a trembling whisper. "It’s someone sitting right across the table from you at every monthly syndicate meeting."
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