Chapter 4 - The Betrayal of the Vane Dynasty
Upstairs, the grand dining room of The Obsidian was unrecognizable. The black marble floors were slick with champagne and crimson. Tables were overturned like children’s blocks, and the crystal chandeliers hung crookedly, sparking as wiring shorted out inside the ceiling.
Celeste Vane stood near the shattered glass wall overlooking the river, her emerald satin gown sweeping the blood-stained floor. Her hair was slightly disheveled, but her smile was sharper and more dangerous than any weapon in the room.
Flanking her were six mercenaries wearing unmarked tactical rigs—professionals hired out of Eastern Europe by her father, Arthur Vane Sr., to wipe out the Moretti leadership in one clean, devastating stroke.
“Sweep the back corridors!” a scarred mercenary commander shouted, signaling toward the service stairs. “Moretti didn't take the bait at the north exit. He’s still in the building!”
Celeste crossed her arms, her diamond necklace flashing under the strobe of police sirens beginning to wail along the riverbank outside. “Find him,” she spat, her sweet debutante voice replaced by a cold, venomous hiss. “And make sure you bring me his signet ring. My father needs proof for the Commission before the sun comes up.”
She had planned this for eleven months. An arranged marriage designed to merge the Vane family’s political corruption with the Moretti syndicate’s distribution network—only to execute a hostile takeover from the inside out. Once Lorenzo was dead, the Vanes would seize the docks, the union contracts, and the North Side territory, framing a rival Sicilian crew for the massacre.
It was a masterpiece of corporate and criminal engineering.
Except for one variable no Ivy League business school could ever account for: a twenty-four-year-old waitress from Cicero who paid attention to details while rich people ignored her existence.
A heavy radio crackled on the mercenary commander's shoulder.
“Alpha Team to Command. We’ve breached the sub-basement access corridor. Movement detected near the laundry chutes. Stand by to flush—”
The transmission cut off with a wet, gurgling crunch, followed by total, suffocating static.
Celeste’s smile faltered. “What was that? Report! Status!”
May you like
Silence hissed back from the radio speaker.
In the shadows of the ruined dining room, the heavy oak doors slowly drifted open.
