Chapter 14 - THE GHOST OF THE PENTHOUSEThree weeks after Marcus’s empire collapsed and the traitors were swept out of Brooklyn, the Moretti estate enjoyed a rare, suffocating kind of quiet. But in the underworld, quiet was never a cure; it was only a holding pattern.
It was midnight when Aleandro stood on the wrap-around balcony of his Manhattan penthouse, a glass of dark bourbon resting in his hand. Below him, the city lights pulsed like synthetic veins, bright and restless. Yet his mind wasn't on the skyline. It was on a name that had stubbornly refused to die.
Sophia walked out onto the balcony, wrapping a thin cashmere shawl tightly around her shoulders. She handed him a sealed, heavy cream envelope bearing no return address—only a wax seal stamped with an emblem Aleandro hadn't seen in over a decade.
"It was left with the estate gate guard by a courier who didn't speak English," Sophia said quietly, her voice tinged with lingering apprehension. "He said it was meant for you alone."
Aleandro set his glass down on the stone railing. His fingers brushed the thick paper. He broke the wax seal with his thumb, unfolded the single sheet of heavy parchment, and read the handwritten words by the city's neon glare:
“The clock in the study was only the first chime, Aleandro. A house built on stolen foundations cannot stand forever when the architect returns from the dead. Look to the harbor where it all began.” — V.S.
Aleandro’s eyes narrowed into hard slits. V.S.
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Valentin Sokolov was locked behind maximum-security federal walls. Isabella was thousands of miles away in a Swiss facility. Unless... there was a third player, a ghost from the old days of the Moretti-Sokolov blood feud whom everyone had assumed died in the harbor explosion of 2018.
"Mateo," Aleandro spoke into his lapel communicator, his voice dropping an octave into pure ice. "Get the tactical team ready. We're heading back down to Pier 44. Tonight, we dig up the past."
