Chapter 24 - The Velvet Box
I approached the stone bench slowly, my boots clicking against the flagstone. The fog rolled in thick from the Atlantic, blurring the dark silhouette of the jagged cliffs below.
Using the barrel of my gun, I nudged the lid of the velvet box open.
Inside rested an old, tarnished silver pocket watch—the exact watch my father had given me on my twenty-first birthday, the one I thought I had lost during the warehouse raid in Queens seven years ago. Engraved on the back were the initials J.H.
And resting right beside it was a folded piece of heavy cardstock paper.
I holstered my weapon, picked up the note with two fingers, and unfolded it under the amber glow of the terrace light. The handwriting was neat, elegant, and entirely unfamiliar—written in dark fountain pen ink.
“Dear Julian, the game on the docks was only the opening move. You saved your daughter, but you forgot that a empire built on blood always requires a sacrifice to balance the books. Look behind you.”
A sharp snap echoed from the dark treeline at the edge of the lawn.
I spun around instantly, raising my gun just as a bright beam of a laser sight flashed across my chest.
Crack.
A silenced rifle bullet slammed into the stone balustrade inches from my shoulder, sending a shower of sharp granite fragments flying into my face.
Before the sniper could cycle a second round, I dropped low behind the stone wall, pulling my encrypted satellite phone from my pocket with my left hand while keeping my weapon trained on the tree line.
"Marcus! We've got a sniper on the east ridge tree line! Lock down the perimeter and deploy the thermal drones!" I roared into the receiver.
May you like
"Already moving, Boss! SWAT teams are sweeping the ridge now!" Marcus yelled back over the sound of barking guard dogs and shouting security guards flooding out of the manor's side exits.
I didn't wait for backup. I vaulted over the stone balustrade, sprinting straight into the dark, mist-shrouded woods where the sniper had vanished.
