Chapter 3 - The Ghost In The Library And The First Line Of Defense
The armored Land Cruiser’s taillights vanished down the long, winding gravel driveway of the estate, swallowed up by the thick fog rolling in off the Long Island Sound.
I watched from the front porch until the red glow completely disappeared from view.
Only then did I turn back toward the mansion.
The house was dead silent.
Not the peaceful, comforting silence of a sleeping home, but the predatory, breathless silence of an ambush waiting to be sprung.
I walked back through the grand foyer, stepping over my fallen leather briefcase without picking it up.
My mind was clear now. The grief, the confusion, and the helplessness that had paralyzed me for over a year had been entirely incinerated, replaced by a cold, surgical focus.
I reached inside my tailored suit jacket, pulled out my Smith & Wesson .38 Special revolver, and checked the cylinder with a flick of my wrist. Fully loaded. Six rounds of hollow-point justice.
I didn't turn on the overhead lights as I moved down the hallway.
I knew every square inch of this mansion. Every creak in the floorboards, every shadow cast by the antique furniture, every blind spot in the security camera grid.
If someone was hiding in my house—if someone had been living in the hollow spaces of this estate while my daughters suffered in silence—they were about to learn why powerful men across New York whispered my name with genuine terror.
I headed straight for the west wing.
The library.
Olivia had said the man with the peppermint and old paper scent stood by the library doors when the house was dark.
The double mahogany doors of the library loomed ahead in the darkness, a massive dark barrier cutting off the end of the corridor.
As I approached, I noticed something I had missed a thousand times before.
A faint, sweet scent hanging in the air near the heavy wooden frame.
Peppermint.
And the dry, stale aroma of old paper.
My grip on the revolver tightened until my knuckles turned white.
I didn't knock. I didn't announce myself.
With a swift, powerful kick of my boot, I smashed the heavy mahogany doors inward.
They splintered off their hinges with a deafening crash, swinging wide into the cavernous, book-lined room.
“Don't move!” I roared, stepping across the threshold with my weapon raised, sweeping the barrel across the dark room.
The amber glow of the streetlights filtering through the stained-glass windows illuminated rows of towering mahogany shelves, a leather Chesterfield sofa, and a large oak executive desk.
At first glance, the room was empty.
No one was standing by the desk. No one was hiding behind the sofa.
Except...
I lowered my eyes to the Persian rug near the fireplace.
Fresh ash spilled out from the iron grate.
And resting on the edge of the mahogany coffee table was a half-empty paper cup of coffee from a deli three blocks away in Manhasset.
Still warm.
The steam was barely visible in the cold air.
He had been standing right here seconds before I kicked the door open.
He had heard me coming.
I spun around, sweeping my revolver toward the hidden private staircase built into the back of the library—a narrow spiral service stair that led up to the servant quarters and the third-floor archival storage rooms.
The iron door at the base of the spiral staircase was standing wide open.
A dark shadow flickered across the stone wall upstairs.
“I see you!” I shouted, breaking into a sprint across the library.
I hit the spiral staircase, taking the iron steps three at a time, my boots ringing out against the metal like hammer blows.
Upstairs, heavy footsteps scrambled across the floorboards of the third-floor storage wing.
It was a labyrinth of forgotten furniture, old art crates, and architectural blueprints from when I renovated the mansion.
A maze where a man who knew the house could easily disappear, ambush, or execute an intruder.
I reached the top of the stairwell, stepping out into the suffocating darkness of the third-floor corridor.
The air up here was stale, thick with dust and the lingering, sickening scent of peppermint.
“Come out and face me, you coward!” I yelled, my voice echoing off the exposed brick walls.
Silence.
May you like
Then, a soft click came from the shadows to my left.
Like the hammer of a gun being pulled back.
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