Chapter 3 - The Blood Trail
At 3:00 AM, the rain finally tapered off into a thick, clinging Louisiana fog that rolled off the Mississippi River, wrapping the French Quarter in a damp, gray shroud.
Declan stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows of his study, holding a crystal glass of neat bourbon. He hadn't touched it. On his desk lay the thumb drive Cersa had brought him. Remy had cleaned the red smear off the plastic casing and plugged it into a air-gapped laptop.
The screen illuminated Declan’s dark features in a soft, blue light.
The files were catastrophic.
Cersa hadn't just completed a routine structural report on the new Mississippi River bridge expansion. She had uncovered a multi-million-dollar fraud scheme orchestrated by the Valenti crime family—Declan’s primary rivals in New Orleans—in collusion with three high-ranking members of the State Department of Transportation.
The Valentis had been using sub-standard, recycled steel and hollowed concrete pillars on the bridge piers, pockets millions in kickbacks. The bridge was a ticking time bomb. If opened to traffic next month, it would collapse under the weight of heavy freight trucks, taking dozens of lives with it.
Cersa had caught the error in the load calculations. When she refused to take a half-million-dollar bribe to alter her findings, they had targeted her sister, Petra, framing the nineteen-year-old girl for a drug felony to keep Cersa in line.
That was when Cersa had walked into Declan’s office two weeks ago, offering him a deal: her engineering expertise to destroy the Valenti family's financial empire in exchange for his syndicate wiping Petra’s record clean and offering them protection.
Declan had viewed her as a tool—a brilliant, desperate tool to be used against his rivals.
Now, looking down at his desk, he saw the truth. She hadn't just given him leverage. She had put herself in the crosshairs of the most dangerous men in the Gulf Coast to deliver the truth to his doorstep.
The study door clicked open.
Remy walked in, wearing his heavy overcoat. His boots were dark with wet mud.
"Found the start of the trail, boss," Remy said in his gravelly voice.
Declan didn't turn around. "Where?"
"Two blocks away, near the alley behind Royal Street. She parked her sedan there. Tires were slashed. Looks like they cornered her as soon as she left her apartment building."
"How many?"
"Two guys. Maybe three," Remy replied, pulling a small silver object from his pocket and setting it on the desk. It was a brass cigarette lighter stamped with a coiled viper—the emblem of Marco Valenti’s personal enforcement crew. "She fought them off with her keys and ran. They chased her through three alleys before she lost them in the fog."
Declan picked up the lighter, turning it over in his heavy fingers. His thumb clicked the wheel. A small orange flame flickered in the dark room, casting long shadows across his face.
"So Marco’s boys thought they could carve up an engineer in my territory," Declan murmured softly.
"They didn't know she was coming to you, boss," Remy said. "If they knew she was under your wing, they wouldn't have dared set foot on Royal Street."
"It doesn't matter what they knew," Declan snapped, his voice sharp enough to draw blood. "They put a knife in her leg. They made her bleed on my floor. That makes it my business."
Declan snapped the lighter shut, extinguishing the flame.
"Where is Marco tonight?"
"He's at the VIP lounge at The Velvet Viper on Canal Street," Remy answered instantly. "Celebrating his birthday with his capos."
May you like
Declan drained his glass of bourbon in one swallow, setting the heavy crystal glass down on the mahogany desk with a sharp clink.
"Get the car, Remy," Declan commanded, pulling a polished silver colt .45 from his shoulder holster and checking the chamber. "It's time to return Marco's lighter."
