Chapter 5 - Smoke and Steel
The gunfire in the hallway lasted barely twenty seconds, but to Julian, trapped beneath the floorboards, it felt like an eternity.
Then, total silence returned.
Slowly, agonizingly, Julian pushed the wooden floorboard upward and peeked out into the study.
The room was illuminated by the dim, flickering embers of the fireplace. Stretched across the carpet near the doorway were two men in black tactical gear, unconscious or dead, bleeding onto the Persian rug. Standing over them, holding a smoking Beretta pistol with absolute calm, was Viktor.
The gray-haired lieutenant looked down at the intruders, then raised his eyes directly toward the desk.
"You can come out now, kid," Viktor called out, his voice steady. "The hallway is secure."
Julian crawled out of the cache, brushing dust and spiderwebs from his cashmere sweater. His hands were shaking uncontrollably. "Are... are they dead?"
"Just sleeping," Viktor replied dryly, checking his weapon's magazine. "Though Vance is going to run out of elite mercenaries soon if he keeps sending them to my boss's front door."
Gabriel walked into the study a moment later, wearing a dark silk robe over his pajamas. He took in the scene with a cold, analytical glance before turning his attention to Julian.
"Are you hurt, boy?" Gabriel asked, stepping forward.
"No," Julian swallowed hard, wiping sweat from his forehead. "They... they were looking for the ledger. They thought I had it."
Gabriel walked over to the desk, kneeling down to inspect the remnants of the broken lock on the bottom drawer. "Vance is getting desperate. He knows the federal grand jury meets next month to review port authority corruption charges. If my people present Elena’s ledger, Vance goes away for the rest of his natural life."
"Then where is it?" Julian asked, looking around the room. "If grandmother had it, and Vance doesn't have it... where is the book?"
Gabriel stood up slowly, looking down at Julian with a profound, heavy expression. "She didn't leave it in a bank vault, Julian. She encoded it. And according to her journal, the key to unlocking the digital files is locked inside a memory that only one person possesses."
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"Who?"
"You."
