Chapter 4 - The Ghost Trail
By noon, the blizzard had worsened into a blinding whiteout that brought the entire city of Chicago to a complete standstill.
Snowplows were abandoned on the expressways as drifts piled four feet high against stalled vehicles and icy overpasses.
Victor sat in the back of his armored Chevrolet Suburban, the engine idling smoothly while Dante drove through the deserted downtown streets with practiced caution.
The heater blasted hot air against Victor’s face, but he felt only a deep, penetrating chill that seemed to originate from inside his own bones.
“We hit paydirt on the security logs, Boss,” Dante said, keeping his eyes fixed on the hazy road ahead through the sweeping wiper blades.
Victor leaned forward from the backseat, resting his forearms on the back of the passenger seat.
“Talk to me,” Victor ordered.
“The security guard on duty in sector four was a rookie named Miller,” Dante explained, his voice low and steady. “He claims he got a call from the internal maintenance extension at 3:30 A.M. telling him to reset the motion sensors for scheduled pipe inspections.”
“A forged internal order,” Victor analyzed instantly. “Who placed the call?”
“We traced the internal routing back to an unused terminal in the basement utility room,” Dante said. “And we pulled the license plate of the vehicle waiting in the alley behind the loading dock.”
Victor’s eyes narrowed. “Whose plate?”
“Registered to a green Ford Explorer owned by a private architectural firm called Meridian Design,” Dante replied, glancing briefly in the rearview mirror. “And get this—Meridian Design was founded six years ago by a man named Julian Vance.”
The name hit Victor like a physical blow to the chest, stopping his breath for a fraction of a second.
Julian Vance.
The name rolled through his memory with the bitter taste of old jealousy and unresolved rivalry from the days before Nora ever met Victor at that charity gala in the Gold Coast.
Julian had been Nora’s senior partner at the university architectural department—a brilliant, idealistic designer who wore tweed jackets, believed in historic preservation, and had been openly in love with Nora for half a decade.
When Victor swept Nora off her feet with expensive champagne, private jets, and the ruthless charm of a man who owned the city, Julian had stepped aside without a fight, disappearing into the academic woodwork of a small college upstate.
Victor had completely forgotten about the man, dismissing him as a harmless relic of Nora’s past who stood no chance against an empire built on power and money.
“Julian Vance,” Victor repeated the name slowly, the syllables tasting like ash on his tongue. “The academic.”
“Don’t let the tweed fool you, Boss,” Dante warned, turning the steering wheel hard to navigate an unplowed corner near the river. “Vance dropped out of academia two years ago and started taking high-end private security and restoration contracts for historical estates across the Midwest. The guy knows structural engineering, logistics, and how to move through the city without leaving a digital footprint.”
Victor slammed his fist against the leather armrest, the anger finally boiling over into raw, unfiltered fury.
While Victor was busy entertaining Sylvia in luxury high-rise suites and playing the kingpin of Chicago, his neglected wife had quietly reached out to the one man from her past who actually knew how to pull off a ghost extraction.
Julian had given her a safe harbor, a vehicle, and a way out of the golden prison Victor had built for her.
“Where is Vance’s primary residence?” Victor demanded, his voice slicing through the hum of the engine.
“That’s the interesting part,” Dante said, hitting the brakes gently as a snowdrift blocked the intersection ahead. “His downtown loft was cleared out three days ago. Furniture sold, lease terminated, accounts closed.”
Victor stared out the frost-covered window at the blurred, ghostly shapes of skyscrapers swallowed by the storm.
“They didn’t run to a hideout in the city,” Victor realized aloud, the pieces finally falling into a terrifyingly coherent design. “They’re heading out of state.”
“North,” Dante confirmed, nodding slowly. “Towards the Wisconsin timber country. Vance owns an isolated family cabin near Lake Geneva that’s completely off the grid—no municipal water, no smart meters, and surrounded by dense pine forests that make aerial surveillance nearly impossible.”
Victor sat back against the leather seat, closing his eyes as the realization washed over him with chilling clarity.
Lake Geneva.
May you like
Three hours north through blinding snowdrifts and frozen highways that would test the limits of any ordinary vehicle on the road.
“Turn the SUV around,” Victor commanded, opening his eyes with a cold, dead certainty in his gaze. “We’re going hunting.”
