Chapter 4 - The Trap SpringsBOOM.
The secondary explosive charge wasn't high-yield military grade; it was designed specifically to bring down structural weight. The roof of the stacked shipping containers groaned, rivets snapping like gunshots as forty tons of rusted steel tilted violently to the left.
"Watch out!" Adrian lunged, grabbing Marcus by the tactical vest and hauling him backward just as a massive, five-ton steel container crashed down precisely where they had been standing, throwing up a blinding cloud of concrete dust and red rust.
Coughing through the thick, metallic haze, Adrian scrambled to his feet, his Glock leveled.
"Marcus! You good?"
"I'm alive!" Marcus coughed, spitting a mouthful of dust, blood trickling from a shallow cut on his forehead. "Damn it, they knew we were coming. This whole yard is wired."
"No," Adrian said, his eyes scanning the maze of fallen iron. "They didn't just know we were coming. They were expecting us to chase them here. This was a diversion."
Adrian froze.
The mansion.
Rachel, Lily, and little Emma were still locked in the panic room back at the estate. Or at least, he thought they were. But if Vanessa was part of an operation deep inside his own empire—an operation that had compromised his home for months—who else was on the payroll?
Who else knew the security codes to the panic room?
"Get the sat-phone," Adrian ordered, his voice dropping into an absolute, chilling calm. "Connect me to internal security at the Lake Forest estate. Now."
Marcus fumbled for his encrypted satellite radio, his fingers flying across the keypad. He pressed it to his ear, listening to the hollow, rhythmic tone of an outgoing secure line.
One ring.
Two rings.
Three rings.
A click.
Instead of the gruff voice of the head of internal security, a different voice came through the static. Low, distorted by a digital voice-changer, but dripping with absolute mockery.
“Looking for your daughter, Mr. Vale?”
Adrian snatched the radio straight out of Marcus’s hand.
"Who is this?" Adrian demanded, every muscle in his body locking like coiled steel.
“Call me an old friend,” the distorted voice replied smoothly. “Or better yet, call me the man who has your little girl. You see, Adrian, you spent eleven years tearing apart street gangs and corrupt politicians, thinking you were the king of Chicago. But you forgot rule number one of the underworld: never leave your inner circle unmonitored.”
"If you touch a single hair on my daughter's head," Adrian whispered, his voice dangerously quiet, "I won't just kill you. I will dismantle every living relative, every associate, and every asset bearing your name until your entire bloodline is erased from human history."
A soft, mocking chuckle came through the speaker.
“Ooh, chilling. Truly terrifying. But your threats don't work when you're thirty minutes away, Mr. Vale. By the time your SUV pulls back through your iron gates, Lily and that little maid’s daughter will be boarding a private freight flight out of O’Hare. If you want to see your daughter again... come alone to the old St. Jude Church on the North Side. Exactly midnight. No guards. No weapons. Just you and the truth.”
May you like
Click.
The line went dead.
