Chapter 3 - The Shadow of Viktor Vance and the Midnight Visitor
The private doctor worked in grim silence for twenty minutes, taping my bruised ribs with clinical precision, administering a heavy dose of anti-inflammatory painkillers, and dressing the raw rope burns around my wrists where the zip-ties had bitten into my flesh.
Gabriel stood motionless by the window the entire time, his silhouette framed against the lightning-lit Chicago skyline, his arms crossed tightly over his chest like a sentinel guarding the gates of hell.
When the doctor finally packed his bags and whispered a final warning about strict bed rest before slipping out the door, the room plunged back into that heavy, suffocating stillness.
“Get some real sleep,” Gabriel commanded without turning around, his voice cutting through the patter of rain against the glass. “You're going to need every ounce of strength you have left.”
“Where are you going?” I asked, watching as he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a heavy, matte-black satellite phone.
“To clean house,” Gabriel replied coldly. “The rats who breached my convoy in Lower Wacker are currently hiding out in a commercial shipping yard down by the Calumet River. By the time the sun comes up over Lake Michigan, there won't be enough left of them to fill a shoebox.”
“You’re going yourself?” I sat up slightly, ignoring the twinge of pain in my side. “That’s a suicide mission. They’re expecting you to retaliate; they’ll have snipers and heavy ordnance waiting.”
Gabriel finally turned his head, a slow, dangerous smirk playing across his mouth—a look that showed precisely why the entire Chicago underworld whispered his name with a mixture of awe and absolute dread.
“Let them wait,” he said softly. Then, with a sharp nod to the empty doorway, he stepped out into the hallway, leaving me alone with the sleeping baby and a storm of racing thoughts.
Hours bled together in the dim, quiet room.
Baby Eli slept soundly against my arm, his breathing soft and rhythmic, completely oblivious to the fact that his uncle had just declared war on half the criminal syndicates in the Midwest.
The digital clock on the mahogany nightstand read 3:42 AM when a faint, metallic click echoed from the heavy oak door of the safe house bedroom.
It wasn't the heavy, confident stride of Mason or the measured pace of Gabriel.
It was a soft, sliding sound—the sound of a master key turning in a lock that was supposed to be picked by no one.
My body froze instantly.
Every instinct I had developed over two years working in the shadows of the Kane empire screamed at me to play dead, but my muscles coiled tightly beneath the heavy wool blankets like a compressed spring.
The door drifted open an inch, letting in a thin sliver of amber light from the hallway.
A gloved hand reached around the wooden frame, silently pushing the door wide open.
A figure slipped into the room, moving with the eerie, silent grace of a ghost.
The intruder wasn't wearing tactical gear or a ski mask; instead, they wore a tailored charcoal trench coat that smelled faintly of sterile hospital disinfectant and expensive French tobacco.
In their right hand, they held a suppressed pistol, the barrel catching the pale moonlight filtering through the rain-streaked window.
I held my breath, sliding my hand slowly across the mattress until my fingers brushed against the heavy brass base of the reading lamp on the nightstand.
The intruder crept toward the bed, their footsteps making zero sound on the thick Persian rug.
They stopped right beside the mattress, staring down at the bundle of blankets where baby Eli was supposedly sleeping.
Except I had quietly shifted Eli’s position five minutes earlier, sliding him toward the far side of the bed near the wall, leaving only a rolled-up pile of pillows under the covers where the baby’s head should have been.
The intruder raised the silenced pistol, aiming directly for the center of the pillows, and squeezed the trigger twice with clinical, cold-blooded precision.
Puff. Puff.
Two silent rounds shredded the goose-down pillows into a storm of white feathers.
Before the assassin could realize the bed was empty, I swung the heavy brass lamp with all the remaining strength in my body, smashing it directly into the side of their head with a deafening crash.
The intruder stumbled sideways, gasping in surprise as their hat knocked loose, revealing a shock of silver-streaked hair and a pale, scarred face that made my blood run instantly cold.
It was a face I recognized instantly from a classified internal personnel file I had audited three days before the ambush—a file stamped with a red DESTROYED label.
It was Viktor Vance.
The man who was supposed to have died in a fiery plane crash over Lake Michigan three years ago.
“You’re supposed to be dead,” I panted, clutching my ribs with one hand while keeping the heavy lamp raised for a second strike.
Viktor wiped a trickle of blood from his temple, letting out a dry, rattling laugh that sounded like dry leaves scraping across concrete.
“Death is just an accounting error, Ms. Bennett,” Viktor rasped, his voice smooth and cultured, carrying a chilling undertone of absolute madness. “And you’ve been auditing books that balance out to a very terminal conclusion.”
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He raised his silenced pistol again, locking his cold gray eyes onto mine with unhurried malice.
“Say hello to Gabriel for me when he finds your body.”
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