Chapter 2 - The Trap Unraveled in Marble & Gold
The emerald ring sparkled under the dim stained-glass light of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, casting a sickly green reflection against the dead woman’s pale skin.
A collective gasp echoed across the vast sanctuary. Two hundred of Chicago’s most powerful figures—underworld bosses, corrupt city officials, and seasoned enforcers—stood frozen in place.
Marcus Blackwood did not yell. He did not lose his composure. The silence that settled around him was far more dangerous than any gun blast.
He slowly lowered the dead woman’s hand back onto the satin lining of the coffin. His eyes, cold as frozen iron, shifted from the corpse toward his sister.
“Victoria,” Marcus said, his voice dropping into a low, gravelly register that made the guards near the altar shiver. “You told me two nights ago that your house was broken into. You wept on my shoulder and claimed a thief took your husband’s heirloom emerald ring.”
Victoria’s posture remained impossibly rigid, but a thin bead of cold sweat broke out along her hairline. “Marcus… listen to me. This is a setup. Someone put that ring on that woman to frame me!”
“To frame you?” Marcus took a single step toward her. “Who put it there, Victoria? The funeral home director who answered only to your personal calls? Or Daniel, who hasn’t let this coffin out of his sight since yesterday morning?”
At the mention of his name, Daniel Reeves panicked.
He lunged toward the side entrance of the cathedral, drawing a suppressed 9mm pistol from beneath his tailored jacket. But he was too slow. Before he could clear his holster, two of Marcus’s personal bodyguards—built like brick walls in dark wool coats—tackled him to the marble floor.
The gun clattered across the stone, spinning until it struck the toe of Mia’s worn, hole-riddled shoe.
Mia flinched, pulling her feet back, but she didn’t run. She stood her ground near the foot of the altar, her tiny fist still trembling from where she had handed Marcus the brass key.
Daniel’s face was slammed hard against the marble. "Marcus! Wait! It wasn't my idea! She forced me!" Daniel screamed, his voice cracking with pathetic desperation. "Victoria said you were getting soft! She said Elena was going to ruin the family business!"
"Silence!" Victoria snapped, her aristocratic facade finally shattering into raw rage. She looked around at the circle of armed guards who were now slowly shifting their weapons from the exits toward her. "Marcus, you're going to take the word of a traitor and a street rat over your own blood?!"
Marcus ignored her completely. He turned toward his head of security, a massive man named Mateo, who had stood at his side for fifteen years.
“Mateo,” Marcus commanded calmly. “Take the girl’s grandmother out of her apartment. Bring her to my private medical wing at St. Anthony’s immediately. Top specialists. Round-the-clock guards. No one enters that room without my personal clearance.”
Mia’s large hazel eyes widened. “My… my grandma? You’re helping her?”
Marcus knelt down on one knee in front of the barefoot seven-year-old child. For the first time in three days, the terrifying, unyielding mob boss of Chicago looked human. He took off his heavy cashmere overcoat and wrapped it around Mia’s shivering shoulders. The coat dragged on the floor, swallowing her tiny frame, but the warmth was instantaneous.
“You brought me the truth, little one,” Marcus said softly, his dark eyes locking onto hers. “As long as I breathe, you and your grandmother will never freeze, beg, or go hungry again. You have my word as a Blackwood.”
Mia swallowed the hard knot in her throat and nodded, clutching the heavy coat around herself.
Marcus stood up, his face hardening back into stone as he looked at Daniel pinned to the floor, and Victoria surrounded by gun barrels.
“Where is my wife?” Marcus asked.
Victoria sneered, folding her arms over her chest. “Do you really think I’d tell you? If I die, Marcus, Elena dies with me. You’ll never find her before the oxygen in that cellar runs out.”
A icy chill cut through the cathedral air. Marcus didn't look surprised. He reached into his pocket and held up the small brass key Mia had brought him, admiring the engraved number: 214.
“Elena knew you better than you think, Victoria,” Marcus said coldly. “She didn’t leave me a confession. She left me a map.”
Marcus motioned to his men. “Lock my sister and Daniel in the sub-basement beneath the warehouse on 4th Street. Do not break their bones yet. I want them awake and conscious when I bring Elena home.”
As Victoria was seized by the guards, screaming curses that echoed up into the vaulted ceilings of the church, Marcus looked down at the brass key in his palm.
May you like
Locker 214.
He didn't know where the lock was located yet, but he knew one thing for certain: Elena was alive. And Chicago was about to burn until he brought her back.
