Chapter 3 - The Ghost of the Vieux Port
The east guest suite was larger than the entire shared apartment Ivy had inhabited during her last year in Marseille.
High vaulted ceilings were decorated with delicate plaster moldings, and French doors opened onto a private stone balcony overlooking the estate's gardens.
On the king-sized bed lay four garment bags of dark Italian wool, fine silk blouses, and a pair of leather oxfords crafted by hand in Florence.
Ivy ran her fingertips over the smooth fabric of a charcoal blazer, the texture entirely alien against her rough, working-class palms.
For three years, she had worn coarse gray polyester that erased her body, her history, and her gender, rendering her nothing more than a cleaning apparatus.
Now, the tailored clothes felt like armor she wasn't certain she was qualified to wear without bleeding through the lining.
A soft knock sounded at the heavy mahogany door, followed immediately by the turning of the brass key.
Rocco Salerno walked into the suite without waiting for an invitation, closing the door firmly behind his back with the heel of his boot.
He had removed his overcoat, revealing the black leather shoulder holster strapped tightly across his broad chest.
"Nice threads," Rocco remarked, his tone dripping with acidic sarcasm as he leaned against the door frame.
"Did Mr. Cole give you permission to enter my room without knocking, Mr. Salerno?" Ivy asked, not turning to face him.
"This isn't your room, girl," Rocco snarled, taking three heavy steps into the center of the Persian rug.
"This is a holding cell with better curtains. You think because Damon bought you some fancy suits, you’re part of the family now?"
Ivy slowly turned around, folding her arms over her chest, her posture completely relaxed despite the proximity of the armed killer.
"I think Damon knows the difference between a dog that barks at shadows and an asset that saves his balance sheet," she said.
Rocco’s face darkened, the veins in his thick neck bulging against his starched white collar.
"I’ve stood beside Damon Cole for fifteen years," Rocco whispered, pointing a heavy finger at her face.
"I took a bullet in the ribs for his father in Brooklyn when you were still playing with dolls in some gutter."
"And yet, you let Jean-Paul Faucher almost bait you into drawing a weapon at a diplomatic dinner," Ivy replied smoothly.
"If I hadn't opened my mouth last night, your corpse would be cooling in a ditch near the river, and Damon would be fighting a two-front war."
Rocco lunged forward, closing the space between them in a flash, his hand wrapping around Ivy’s throat with brutal force.
He slammed her back against the armoire, the wood splintering behind her shoulder blades with a sickening crack.
Ivy did not gasp, nor did she claw at his thick fingers; she simply stared into his bloodshot eyes with a chilling, dead calm.
"Listen to me, you little street rat," Rocco hissed, his breath hot against her cheek.
"I don't care how many languages you can chirp in. You take one wrong step around Damon, you look at his accounts funny, and I will put you in a barrel."
"Do it," Ivy choked out, her voice barely a whisper through her restricted airway, but her gaze remained completely steady.
"Choke me out right here, Rocco. And then explain to Damon why his twenty-five percent harbor contract just sailed back to France."
Rocco’s fingers tightened for another terrifying second, his teeth grinding together so loudly she could hear the enamel scraping.
Then, with a furious curse, he shoved her away, letting her drop onto the edge of the mattress.
Ivy drew in a long, quiet breath, her hand coming up to touch the red marks forming on her pale neck, but her eyes never wavered from his face.
"You're good," Rocco muttered, straightening his silk tie with jerky, irritated movements.
"You’re very good at acting like you don't have anything to lose. But everybody has something to lose, Ivy."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a faded, laminated photograph, tossing it onto the bedspread between them.
Ivy’s stomach dropped into a bottomless, icy pit as her eyes landed on the glossy paper.
It was a photograph of a small, sun-bleached tavern sitting on the edge of the docks in Cassis, twenty miles east of Marseille.
Standing beneath the faded blue awning was an older man with graying hair and an eye patch, laughing with a younger, dark-haired girl.
"The Bar des Flots," Rocco said, watching her face like a hawk waiting for a rabbit to twitch.
"Burned down four years ago after an unfortunate dispute with the Corsican syndicate over protection fees."
Ivy did not look away from the photograph; her heart hammered violently against her ribcage, but her breathing remained perfectly rhythmic.
"The owner was a man named Henri Marlowe," Rocco continued, stepping closer to the bed.
"Ex-legionnaire, dock smuggler, and a drunkard who owed three hundred thousand euros to the wrong people."
"My father died four years ago, Mr. Salerno," Ivy said, her voice dropping into a register that was completely devoid of life.
"You're not telling me anything I didn't watch with my own eyes while the fire engines were stuck in traffic."
"Henri Marlowe had a daughter," Rocco said, his voice dropping into a low, predatory purr.
"A daughter who vanished from southern France three weeks after the Corsicans put a bounty on the entire family line."
Ivy reached out, took the faded photograph, and slipped it beneath the edge of the bedside lamp.
"If the Corsicans wanted me dead, they should have hired a better arsonist," she said quietly.
"Damon doesn't know this yet," Rocco said, tapping his holster with the knuckle of his right hand.
"He thinks you're just some clever Midwestern girl who picked up French on a gap year. If I tell him you brought a Corsican blood feud into his house..."
"If you tell him," Ivy interrupted, standing up from the bed and stepping directly into Rocco's space,
"he will ask you why you didn't run the background check three years ago when I applied to mop his floors."
Rocco blinked, his smirk faltering slightly as the logic settled into his thick skull.
"You were in charge of household security, weren't you, Rocco?" she continued, pressing her advantage without mercy.
"If I am a security breach, who let me sleep under Damon’s roof for thirty-six months without verifying my papers?"
Rocco stared at her, the realization dawning on him that exposing her past would simultaneously expose his own colossal incompetence.
Before he could find an answer, the heavy door clicked open once more, and Damon Cole stood framed in the entrance.
Damon’s cold eyes traveled from Rocco’s clenched fists to the splintered wood on the armoire, and finally to the red bruises on Ivy’s throat.
The temperature in the suite plummeted instantly, the air turning so thick with menace that even Rocco stepped back half a pace.
"Rocco," Damon said, his tone deceptive in its absolute softness.
"Boss," Rocco answered quickly, his voice tight. "Just running through the security protocols with the girl."
"Did the security protocols require you to put your hands on my employee’s throat?"
Rocco swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing over his silk collar. "She was acting evasive about her paperwork, Damon. I was just—"
"Get out," Damon said.
"Damon, listen to me—"
"Get out of this room before I take your sidearm and use it on you," Damon whispered, the calm venom in his delivery far more terrifying than a shout.
Rocco did not say another word; he lowered his head, pushed past Damon in the doorway, and vanished down the carpeted corridor.
Damon stepped into the room, closing the door behind him with a soft, definitive click that sealed out the rest of the world.
He walked across the floor, stopping in front of Ivy, his eyes dropping to the dark red impressions left by Rocco’s fingers on her skin.
He reached into his pocket, pulled out a clean linen handkerchief, and held it out to her.
"You should put ice on that," Damon said quietly.
Ivy did not take the handkerchief; she kept her hands at her sides, her chin raised in quiet defiance.
"I don't need ice, Mr. Cole. I need you to keep your dog on a shorter leash if you want me to speak for you."
A faint flicker of amusement, dark and fleeting, crossed Damon’s chiseled features.
"Rocco has been loyal to my family since I was twelve years old," Damon said, tucking the handkerchief back into his suit coat.
"Loyalty without intelligence is just an expensive liability," Ivy countered, not backing down an inch.
"He’s terrified that you don't need him anymore because a maid did his job with a silver tray in her hands."
Damon tilted his head slightly, studying her face with the clinical precision of a surgeon inspecting an incision.
"Put on the charcoal suit," Damon instructed her. "The black Mercedes will be at the front entrance in twenty minutes."
"Where are we going?"
"To the industrial park in Newark," Damon said, his eyes darkening as he turned toward the door.
"The Bratva took three of my shipping manifests from the docks this morning. They want a meeting to discuss the new harbor boundaries."
Ivy felt a cold chill run through her veins, remembering the slang she had used with Faucher only hours earlier.
"The Russians don't negotiate through translators, Mr. Cole. They use brute force and local enforcers."
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Damon paused at the doorway, looking back at her over his shoulder with a gaze that could have frozen fire.
"That is why you are coming with me, Ivy," he said softly. "Let’s see if your Russian is as sharp as your dock slang."
