Chapter 7 - Crimson Heritage
Clara’s hands hovered over the open pages. "Alive? But... the police found his car in the river. They found his wallet, his coat..."
"They found what he wanted them to find," Silas replied, leaning against the heavy workbench. "David Vance was the Syndicate’s chief archivist for thirty years. He held the secrets of every politician, judge, and cartel boss on this continent. When he tried to retire, Moretti gave the order to liquidate him. David staged his death and went underground."
"Then why target me now?" she pleaded, looking into Silas's stoic face. "I haven't heard from him in six years. I lived in youth hostels! I worked minimum wage jobs! I don't know anything!"
"You don't need to know anything," Silas said, his voice dropping into grim certainty. "You are the key. David designed a cryptographic lock for the Syndicate’s offshore accounts. It requires two biometrics to unlock the vault holding over four billion dollars in black-market assets: David's retinal scan, and a bloodline DNA sequence. Yours."
Clara backed away from the desk, horror dawning upon her. "They don't want to kill me."
"Marcus wants to drag you to Moretti's vault in the Financial District," Silas confirmed. "They’ll draw your blood, empty the accounts, and then bury you in concrete at the bottom of the harbor."
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A sudden chime echoed through the warehouse. Silas’s eyes flicked to a multi-monitor display on the wall. The perimeter motion sensors in the shipping yard had just gone dark, one by one.
Silas reached across the table, racking the slide of an assault rifle. "They traced the transponder on my sedan."
