Chapter 5 - The Red Flag at the Vault
Calder leaned forward between the front bucket seats. "Speak."
"I pinged our safe house network on the private frequency," Owen said, tapping the encrypted dashboard display. "The secure line to the Vault didn't respond. It gave an automatic echo ping. That means the master circuit was cut manually from the breaker room."
Calder’s eyes narrowed into slits. "Emmett anticipated the safe house. He has eyes on every property deeded under the corporate umbrella."
"Where do we go?" Owen asked, his knuckles white on the leather steering wheel. "If the precinct is compromised and the safe houses are marked, Emmett has locked down the transit corridors. The bridges out of Greyhaven will be watched."
Calder didn't hesitate. "My personal penthouse. The glass tower on Sovereign Hill."
Mara looked up, her expression alarmed. "Calder, that’s suicide! The penthouse is a glass box. Everyone in the city knows you live there. Emmett will send an army."
"That’s exactly why we're going there," Calder replied, his voice dead and terrifyingly calm. "Emmett expects me to run to a bunker. He expects me to scurry into the shadows like a wounded dog. He doesn't expect me to walk straight into the center of the board and invite him inside."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his secondary encrypted phone. He dialed a six-digit code. The line connected after half a ring.
"Wynn," a gravelly voice answered. It was Frank Gallagher, the veteran commander of Calder’s private waterfront security team—men who answered solely to Calder, bypassing the corrupt family syndicate.
"Frank," Calder said coldly. "The war just started. Emmett went after a minor under my protection. Mobilize the harbor units. Seal the access elevators to the Sovereign Tower. Anyone who steps out of an elevator without my personal authorization code gets put into the floor."
"Understood, Boss. What about Emmett?"
"Tell the captains to freeze his accounts at the freight terminals. Cut off his fuel supplies. Turn off his access to the southern docks. Starve him out."
Calder ended the call and turned back to Mara and Clara. "We have twenty minutes before Emmett realizes we skipped the safe house. Clara, you need food and dry clothes. Mara, your arm needs to be set properly; I know a fractured collarbone when I see how you hold your shoulder."
Mara gave a faint, stubborn smirk despite the pale agony on her face. "You always were too observant, Mr. Wynn."
"Four years of watching you run my life, Mara," Calder murmured softly, his gray eyes locking onto hers with an intensity that made her breath hitch. "I notice everything you do."
Ten minutes later, the black sedan slipped through the subterranean gates of Sovereign Tower, the city’s tallest residential monolith. The private freight elevator whirred to life, carrying them sixty floors above the drenched streets of Greyhaven.
When the elevator doors parted, the luxurious, minimalist penthouse opened before them. Wall-to-wall glass displayed the sweeping panorama of the black Atlantic Ocean and the sprawling grid of city lights. But the beauty of the room offered no comfort. On the glass coffee table in the center of the living room sat a single, silver champagne bucket.
May you like
Resting inside the ice was a fresh red rose, tied with a black silk ribbon.
And sitting on the couch with a glass of Calder’s twenty-year-old scotch in his hand was Emmett Wynn.
