Chapter 7 - THE CRUMBLING EMPIREWithin forty-eight hours, the financial heart of Boston experienced a catastrophic cardiac arrest.
Richard Vance sat in his penthouse office on the fiftieth floor of the Apex Tower, watching CNN on a muted flat-screen while his phone rang continuously, an unbroken symphony of panic.
Apex Capital stock plunges 42% amid rumors of federal federal investigation.
Federal agents raid Apex subsidiaries across three states.
Anonymous block-chain transfers drain $80 million from offshore accounts linked to Richard Vance.
"Sir! We're finished!" Vance's chief legal counsel shouted, bursting through the mahogany double doors without knocking, waving a stack of red-flagged audit reports. "The banks have frozen our lines of credit! The SEC is seizing our hard drives! And... and the shipping unions have completely blockaded every cargo ship we own in Boston Harbor!"
Vance stood up slowly, his face drained of all color, his bespoke tie loosened around his collar. He had bought politicians. He had bribed judges. He had thought himself untouchable.
He hadn't accounted for Daniel Reyes.
The heavy glass doors of the private elevator at the end of the penthouse hallway chimed with a polite, single ping.
The building's private security team—twenty heavily armed mercenaries stationed throughout the tower—didn't even scream. A series of muffled thuds echoed down the carpeted hallway, followed by the heavy, unmistakable click-clack of dog claws on polished marble.
Vance reached frantically for the gold-plated Smith & Wesson sitting in his desk drawer.
Before his fingers could touch the grip, the heavy oak doors of his office blew inward.
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Daniel Reyes walked in. He wasn't wearing a tuxedo or a tactical vest. He wore a simple black turtleneck and dark slacks, his face completely expressionless, carrying the weight of an executioner who had already weighed a man's soul and found it wanting.
Behind him padded Bruno, shaking a few drops of rain from his slate-colored coat, his amber eyes locked onto Vance like a missile tracking a thermal signature.
