The three auditors entered his office and began their work with the silent, methodical efficiency of people who did this for a living. They opened filing cabinets. They pulled binders from shelves. They connected a portable drive to his workstation and began copying files.Gavin sat at the small conference table near the window, his coffee growing cold, his smile growing harder to maintain with every passing minute.By noon, two additional investigators had arrived. They brought laptops and a portable scanner. They set up in the corner of Gavin's office like an occupying force establishing a forward base.The sweat on Gavin's forehead appeared around one thirty. By two, it had traveled to his temples. By three, it was visible to anyone who walked past his glass office door, which was approximately every employee on the nineteenth floor, most of whom suddenly found reasons to visit the copy room that happened to be located directly across the hall.I deleted those files. I moved those

The office occupied the entire top floor of the Steele Corporation tower.Floor to ceiling windows wrapped around three walls, offering a view of Creston City that made everything below look small and manageable. The furniture was dark wood and leather, arranged with the precision of a man who believed his environment should reflect his authority.Marcus Steele sat behind his desk, a thick file open in front of him, his reading glasses balanced on the bridge of his nose.His eyes moved across the pages with the unhurried patience of someone who treated information the way a surgeon treats instruments. Every detail examined. Every fact weighed. Nothing skipped.The file contained a complete summary of the Skyline Grand incident.Photographs taken by guests. Transcripts of social media posts. A timeline reconstructed from multiple accounts.And at the center of it all, a name that kept appearing on every page like a thread running through the entire fabric of the story.Logan Mercer.Ma

"Everything in that report tells me that Logan Mercer is either the luckiest man alive or the most carefully hidden one. And in my experience, luck doesn't survive multiple encounters with powerful people. Lucky men get exposed. Hidden men get more interesting."Brandon's fists loosened. His breathing slowed. The rage that had been boiling behind his eyes cooled to something that still burned but no longer threatened to overflow."So what do we do?" Brandon's voice came out smaller than he intended."We do nothing." Marcus pressed a button on his desk phone. "You do nothing. You go home. You stay quiet. You stop talking about Logan Mercer in public. And you wait for me to tell you when to move."The office door opened, and a man in a dark gray suit stepped inside. His name was Daniel Frost, and he had served as Marcus Steele's personal intelligence director for eleven years. He was lean, sharp eyed, and carried himself with the quiet efficiency of a man who had never failed an assignm

"Which means one of two things." Marcus set the pen down. "Either he is the luckiest man alive and has somehow stumbled into the protection of multiple powerful individuals through a series of extraordinary coincidences. Or someone has buried his real identity so deep that the surface records we're looking at are nothing more than a carefully maintained cover story."Daniel waited."In your experience, Daniel, how often does luck survive contact with Victor Kane?""Never." Daniel's answer was immediate. "Kane doesn't operate on luck. He operates on information and leverage. If he respects someone, it's because that person has demonstrated something that commands respect. Not once, but consistently."Marcus nodded slowly. He picked up the reports and stacked them into a single pile, tapping the edges against the desk until they were perfectly aligned.Then he did something Daniel had never seen him do in eleven years of service.He smiled.Not the cold, calculating expression he wore i

"We don't know yet." Carl shifted in his chair. "Their money trail is buried. They're using cash for everything. No bank accounts. No wire transfers. Nothing we can trace through normal channels.""A gang that appeared six months ago doesn't take over three of my businesses in one night without resources." Victor's eyes moved across the faces of his men. "Resources they didn't have last month. Someone is financing them. Someone is arming them. And someone is telling them exactly where to hit us.""Does it matter who?" Ray's patience was fraying. "We crush the Serpents first, then find out who was pulling their strings.""It matters." Victor's voice hardened. "Because if someone is provoking us into a war, they want us to attack first. They want us to commit our resources, expose our positions, and exhaust our strength on a fight that was designed to drain us. And while we're busy destroying the Serpents, whoever is behind them sits in the shadows and waits for us to weaken."The room