Chapter 4 - The Ledger of the Dead
The iron grate of the abandoned drainage duct was slick with moss and cold river slime. Dante worked the rusted hinges with a crowbar, muffling the metallic groan with a wet towel.
Sophie squeezed through the gap first, the damp cold penetrating her thin clothing immediately. Pain radiated through her patched shoulder, but adrenaline acted like liquid ice in her veins, dulling the ache. Above her, the heavy boots of Julian’s mercenaries echoed across the floorboards of the warehouse.
Luca dropped silently into the crawlspace behind her, moving like a phantom despite his massive frame. He caught her waist as she slipped on the muddy incline, pulling her flush against his chest.
"Two guards above the catwalk," Luca whispered directly into her ear, his breath hot against the chill of the tunnel. "Dante will take the eastern perimeter. When the lights flicker, you scramble through the chute. You drop into the office, secure the deadbolt, and stay flat. Do not play the hero. Understand?"
Sophie nodded, clutching the small, compact pistol Luca had forced into her hand.
Above them, Julian Moretti’s voice echoed through the vast, empty cavern of Pier 42.
"Where is the key, Aunt Eleanor?" Julian shouted, followed by the sickening sound of an open-handed slap echoing against cold concrete.
Sophie felt Luca’s entire body go rigid. A terrifying, primeval vibration rose from his chest. His fingers dug into the concrete wall so hard the masonry flaked beneath his fingernails.
"You always looked down on me," Julian’s voice sneered, dripping with years of bottled resentment. "Luca was the golden boy. Luca inherited the docks. Luca inherited the political connections. But your husband knew what I was capable of! That's why he kept the original offshore accounts sealed behind this door. He was going to cut my branch of the family out entirely!"
"My husband... knew you were a parasite, Julian," Eleanor Moretti’s frail, aristocratic voice wheezed in response. She was coughing, her breaths ragged and wet. "You sold our family manifests to the Albanians fifteen years ago. You let them ambush Vittorio. And you think... you think my son won't slaughter you for this?"
"Your son is currently hosting eighty senators at the estate, wondering why the dessert course is delayed," Julian laughed, a high, manic sound. "By the time he figures out you're gone, the fire will have consumed Pier 42, along with your body and every ledger Vittorio left behind. The commission will have no choice but to appoint me as regent."
"Now," Luca whispered into the darkness.
Dante severed the primary electrical feed to the pier.
The warehouse plunged into pitch-black void.
Instant chaos erupted. Shouts in Russian and English rang out across the cavernous room. Flashlights clicked on, beams cutting through the heavy mist.
*Pfft. Pfft.*
Two muffled gunshots whistled through the dark. A mercenary on the upper catwalk screamed, tumbling over the railing and crashing forty feet onto a wooden crate below. Dante had opened fire.
"Kill the old woman! Burn the room!" Julian shrieked in absolute terror.
Sophie didn't think. She lunged through the narrow ventilation chute, ignoring the agony tearing at her wounded shoulder. Her body slid down the smooth sheet metal, dumping her out into the dusty, blood-splattered interior of the secondary office.
The room was lit only by an emergency red exit sign.
Tied to a heavy mahogany chair in the center of the room was Eleanor Moretti. Her silver hair was matted with blood, her cheek swollen, her silk evening blouse torn. Across from her stood a mercenary with a gallon of gasoline in one hand and a flare in the other.
He turned, startled by Sophie’s sudden entrance from the ceiling.
"What the—" the mercenary began, dropping the fuel can and reaching for his sidearm.
Sophie didn't hesitate. She remembered Luca’s words: *Center of the chest.*
With both hands gripping the pistol, her eyes wide with desperate terror, Sophie pulled the trigger twice.
The suppressed weapon coughed twice in rapid succession. The heavy slugs slammed into the mercenary's chest, throwing him back against the wooden wall. He slid down, leaving two streaks of dark crimson, unmoving.
Sophie dropped to her knees, trembling violently, the gun slipping from her sweat-slicked fingers.
"Sophie...?" Eleanor Moretti’s voice was barely a gasp.
"I'm here, Mrs. Moretti. I'm here," Sophie sobbed softly, scrambling across the floor. She grabbed the dead mercenary's combat knife and began slicing through the thick zip-ties binding the matriarch’s frail wrists.
"The... the desk," Eleanor coughed, clutching her chest as her heart fluttered erratically. "Beneath the false drawer. The ledger... Julian didn't find it. The blue door... it was never the warehouse door, child. It was the blue iron safe inside the wall."
Suddenly, the heavy wooden door of the office splintered inward under the impact of a shotgun blast.
Wood splinters showered the room.
Julian Moretti stepped through the smoke, a smoking Benelli shotgun in his grip, his designer suit spattered with mud, his face contorted in demonic rage.
"You," Julian spat, leveling the barrel directly at Sophie’s forehead. "The pathetic little maid from the kitchen. You dare touch my family's legacy?"
Sophie froze, shielding Eleanor’s body with her own.
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"Step aside, little girl," Julian sneered, finger tightening on the trigger. "Or your blood cleans the floor first."
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