CHAPTER 2 – THE PRICE OF FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS
CHAPTER 2 – THE PRICE OF FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS
Emmett didn't answer Mrs. Ingrid immediately.
His eyes remained fixed on the report.
Fifty thousand dollars.
It wasn't enough money to betray a city.
It wasn't enough to disappear.
It wasn't enough to risk a child's life.
But it was exactly the kind of amount desperate people accepted when they believed they had no other choice.
Tommy Vale stepped into the office without knocking.
His expression alone told Emmett the morning was about to get worse.
"I found something."
Emmett motioned toward the desk.
"Talk."
Tommy laid down a faded photograph.
It showed Diana Harper standing outside a downtown hotel.
She was smiling.
Beside her stood a little girl holding a stuffed rabbit.
Luna.
Across the street, barely visible in the reflection of a store window, another figure watched them.
A man in a dark coat.
Tommy slid a second photograph beside it.
The same man.
Different day.
Different location.
Watching again.
"We enhanced the image," Tommy said quietly. "Facial recognition finally gave us a match."
Emmett's jaw tightened.
"Victor."
Tommy nodded.
"Alive."
The room fell silent.
Five years.
Five years everyone believed Victor Brennon had burned to death in a warehouse explosion on the South Side.
Five years Emmett had considered the chapter closed.
Instead...
Victor had spent those years rebuilding.
Not loudly.
Not recklessly.
Quietly.
Patiently.
Like a disease spreading beneath healthy skin.
Mrs. Ingrid whispered, "Dear Lord..."
Tommy continued.
"He changed his appearance. Grew a beard. Lost weight. Used three different aliases. But the ears never changed. Neither did the scar behind his left hand."
Emmett remembered giving him that scar.
A broken whiskey bottle.
A punishment for stealing from the organization.
Victor had smiled while bleeding.
"I'll remember this," he had said.
Apparently...
He had.
Upstairs...
Luna woke to the smell of cinnamon.
Mrs. Ingrid sat beside her bed carrying a tray.
Toast.
Scrambled eggs.
Hot chocolate.
Luna stared at the food as though it belonged to someone else.
"You should eat, sweetheart."
Luna hesitated.
"Can I... save some for my mom?"
Mrs. Ingrid's smile almost broke.
"We'll make her fresh food when she comes."
Luna nodded, pretending to believe it.
She picked up the spoon carefully.
Every movement was cautious.
Measured.
The behavior of a child who had learned food could disappear without warning.
Mrs. Ingrid watched in silence.
Children raised in love inhaled breakfast.
Children raised in fear counted every bite.
Downstairs...
Tommy spread more files across the conference table.
"There's another problem."
Emmett looked up.
"Diana wasn't taking money from Victor."
"What?"
"She was stealing it."
Emmett frowned.
Tommy opened a bank ledger.
"For nearly eight months Diana worked nights at the Grand Wellington Hotel."
"Go on."
"Victor owned a private suite there under a fake corporation."
Every week...
Cash arrived.
Encrypted hard drives.
Locked briefcases.
Meetings lasting exactly thirty minutes.
No hotel staff allowed inside.
Until...
One waitress accidentally walked in.
Diana Harper.
She wasn't supposed to see what she saw.
Instead of killing her...
Victor recruited her.
Or so everyone believed.
Tommy pushed forward another folder.
"But our financial analyst noticed something strange."
Every payment Victor sent Diana...
Disappeared within hours.
Transferred again.
Split into dozens of tiny transactions.
Medical charities.
Women's shelters.
Children's hospitals.
Anonymous trusts.
Food banks.
Emmett blinked.
"She gave it away."
Tommy nodded slowly.
"Almost every dollar."
Mrs. Ingrid covered her mouth.
"My God..."
"So why keep working for him?" Emmett asked.
Tommy looked toward the window.
"Because she wasn't working for him."
"What do you mean?"
Tommy reached into his coat.
"I had someone break into Victor's abandoned accounting office this morning."
He placed a flash drive on the table.
"This was hidden inside the wall."
The video flickered to life.
Security footage.
Low quality.
Date stamped...
Three months earlier.
Victor sat at the head of a conference table.
Around him stood six armed men.
Diana was there.
Hands tied.
Bruised.
Terrified.
Victor smiled at the camera.
"If you're watching this..."
He leaned forward.
"...then Diana disappointed me."
He grabbed a folder.
Inside were photographs.
Children.
Dozens of them.
Some crying.
Some sleeping.
Some obviously terrified.
Luna's school picture appeared among them.
Emmett's blood ran cold.
Victor spoke calmly.
"Every one of these children belongs to someone who owes me."
He looked toward Diana.
"You had one job."
The next image appeared.
A ledger.
Names.
Politicians.
Police officers.
Judges.
Business executives.
Alongside each...
Payments.
Blackmail.
Human trafficking routes.
Illegal adoptions.
Missing children.
Tommy whispered, "This isn't a gang ledger."
"No."
Emmett's voice became ice.
"It's an empire."
Victor continued.
"Diana copied my files."
He laughed.
"I admire courage."
Then his smile disappeared.
"But courage has consequences."
He lifted Luna's school photo.
"If Diana doesn't return everything she stole..."
He burned the picture with a lighter.
"...I'll start with her daughter."
The video ended.
No one spoke.
Not for a full minute.
Finally...
Emmett stood.
Every man in the room instinctively straightened.
His expression had changed.
There was no anger anymore.
Only purpose.
"Find Diana."
Tommy nodded.
"We're trying."
"No."
Emmett's voice echoed through the mansion.
"You're not trying."
He pointed at the screen showing Luna's smiling school portrait.
"A mother spent months risking her life to steal evidence from a monster."
He picked up the flash drive.
"She emptied fifty thousand dollars into charities instead of saving herself."
He slipped the drive into his pocket.
"And then she sent her daughter here."
Mrs. Ingrid looked at him.
"What are you going to do?"
Emmett slowly buttoned his black overcoat.
"Victor Brennon believes he knows how this story ends."
His eyes turned as cold as the Chicago snow outside.
"He thinks Diana is alone."
He reached for the pistol lying inside the desk drawer.
The familiar weight settled into his hand.
"He's about to discover..."
Emmett chambered a round.
"...that he just declared war on the only man in Chicago who never forgives anyone for threatening a child."
At that exact moment—
A deafening explosion shattered every window on the first floor.
The mansion shook violently.
Security alarms screamed.
Outside, flames erupted near the front gate.
One of the guards yelled through the radio—
"Boss!"
May you like
"They're here!"
"Victor's men have Luna!"
