Chapter 2 - THE GHOSTS OF DORCHESTERThe private medical suite at Massachusetts General Hospital smelled of antiseptic and polished chrome—a sterile contrast to the filth of the underpass.
Elaine Reyes lay propped up on white pillows, an IV drip pumping saline and heavy vitamins into her withered arm. Private security guards stood outside the double doors, hand-picked by Daniel to ensure no unauthorized personnel came within a hundred yards of the floor. Inside, Daniel sat in a stiff vinyl chair beside the bed, staring at his hands.
For two hours, doctors had run tests: severe malnutrition, chronic bronchitis, early-stage dementia, and old, untreated fractures in her ribs and wrists that told a silent story of violence on the streets.
"She survived," Daniel whispered to the empty room, though Bruno was curled up tight against the base of the bed, his amber eyes fixed on Elaine's face. "How did she survive twenty years out there, Bruno?"
The dog let out a soft huff.
Daniel's mind raced back across the decades, pulling up the bitter memories he had used as mortar to build his criminal empire. When he walked out at sixteen, he told himself she didn't care. He told himself that Marcus—the adopted boy who had stolen his mother's attention—was the golden child who got everything while Daniel got scraps.
But as he watched Elaine mutter incoherently in her sleep, repeating names he didn't recognize, a gnawing, horrific suspicion began to take root in his chest.
Why did she disappear?
People don't just vanish from a walk-up in Dorchester unless someone makes them vanish.
His phone buzzed on the bedside table. The caller ID showed a private, encrypted number. It was Vinny "The Sieve" Russo, his chief fixer and the man who knew every dirty secret buried beneath Boston's asphalt.
Daniel swiped the screen and pressed it to his ear. "Talk to me."
"Boss," Vinny's voice sounded tight, unusually nervous. "You told me to run a background check on what happened to the Dorchester apartment after you left in '06. I dug into the city archives, property deeds, and old police blotters. Boss... your mother didn't abandon that apartment. And she didn't just walk away."
Daniel's grip on the phone tightened until his knuckles turned white. "What are you talking about, Vinny?"
"Three months after you left, the rent was paid in full—not by Elaine, and not by your stepfather. It was paid in cash by a corporate shell company. A shell company owned by a real estate holding group called Apex Capital."
Daniel’s blood ran cold. Apex Capital was fronted by a man named Richard Vance—a billionaire philanthropist, city council donor, and the primary financial backer of Marcus Reyes.
May you like
Marcus.
"Keep digging," Daniel commanded, his voice shaking with a fury that threatened to shatter the phone. "Find out where Marcus is right now. Every address, every bank account, every dark corner."
