Chapter 6 - The Unlocked Vault and the Hidden Compartment
By nightfall, the compound was secured by twenty of Declan’s elite private security operatives. The bodies of the mercenaries had been removed for biometric identification, and the fire in the basement archive had been contained before reaching the central records.
Inside the estate’s grand library, Declan sat behind an enormous oak desk, the yellowed 1994 folder open before him. Leo stood near the roaring fireplace, bandaging his shoulder.
Sadie sat on a velvet armchair across from Declan, nursing an ice pack against her strained bicep.
“Mikhail ran the biometrics on the shooters,” Declan said, breaking the heavy silence. “Two former French foreign legionnaires, two contract killers out of Marseille. Hired through an offshore shell company based in Cyprus.”
“Who owns the shell company?” Leo asked.
“A blind trust managed by an executive board that dissolved in nineteen-ninety-five,” Declan answered. He turned his gaze toward Sadie. “A trust named Moretti Maritime Holding.”
The room grew dead silent.
Sadie kept her expression perfectly blank, but her pulse hammered in her ears.
“The Moretti family again,” Declan murmured, drumming his fingers on the oak desk. “A family that supposedly vanished from this city thirty years ago after a gang war that wiped out their entire leadership.”
“Maybe a surviving heir is trying to reclaim their lost assets,” Leo suggested.
Declan shook his head slowly. “The Morettis didn't have surviving heirs. Anthony Moretti was killed in a car bombing in ninety-four. His wife died in the hospital three days later. Their seven-year-old daughter was listed as missing and presumed dead after the family estate burned to the ground.”
Sadie looked down at the ice pack in her hands, her knuckles turning white.
Declan stood up and walked around the desk. He stopped directly in front of Sadie, looking down at her with an intensity that seemed to peel away her defenses layer by layer.
“In the basement today, Sadie,” Declan said, his voice quiet and dangerous. “You fired an antique, uncalibrated forty-five with thirty-pound recoil and hit a moving target center-mass through heavy smoke. You identified the Moretti private seal on a thirty-year-old ledger within three seconds of seeing it.”
“I told you, I have an eye for historical documents,” Sadie said, looking up to meet his gaze.
Declan leaned down, resting his hands on the armrests of her chair, trapping her within his space. His dark eyes searched hers with unrelenting focus.
“Who are you, Sadie?” he whispered. “Because I know for a fact you’re not an ordinary girl from South Boston who applied for an executive assistant job on LinkedIn.”
Sadie felt his breath warm against her skin. The proximity was intoxicating, dangerous, and terrifyingly intimate.
“If I was your enemy, Declan,” Sadie said softly, her voice unwavering, “I would have let that mercenary shoot you in the back ten minutes ago.”
Declan’s jaw clenched. The logic was indisputable, yet the mystery around her was expanding into an insurmountable wall.
“That doesn't make you an ally,” Declan retorted. “It just means you need me alive for whatever game you’re playing.”
Before Sadie could respond, Leo cleared his throat from the fireplace.
“Boss,” Leo called out, holding up an old, dust-covered leather photo album he had pulled from an iron strongbox retrieved from the basement. “Found this in the back of the grandfather’s private safe. It wasn't with the corporate ledgers. It was stored with his personal will and family heirlooms.”
Declan straightened up, breaking the magnetic tension between him and Sadie. He walked over to the fireplace and took the heavy, weathered album from Leo’s hands.
The album was bound in cracked brown calfskin, with the Hayes family crest stamped in faded gold on the cover: Hayes - 1980 to 1995.
Declan opened the heavy parchment pages. Inside were black-and-white and early color photographs of his grandfather, Arthur Hayes, standing beside port authorities, union bosses, and old-era dons at weddings, banquets, and secret summit meetings.
Declan turned the pages slowly, his eyes tracking the history of his bloodline.
Then, on page forty-two, Declan stopped.
His entire body went rigid. His breath hitched in his throat.
Leo noticed the sudden shift. “Boss? What is it?”
May you like
Declan didn't answer. He stared at the photograph on the page, his knuckles turning stark white as his grip tightened on the leather cover until the old binding groaned.
Sadie watched him from across the room, a sudden, cold sense of impending doom rising in her throat.
