Chapter 3 - The Trap at Harbor Nine
The flames in the fireplace crackled softly, casting dancing, menacing shadows across the long walnut table.
Graham Sloan’s eyes flicked toward the gun resting on the table, then to the heavy double doors. He knew the estate was locked down. The Viscari estate was a fortress—walled compound, bulletproof glass, private security guards loyal only to the head of the house.
"Nico," Graham said, his voice dropping into a desperate plea. "You're reacting emotionally. Audra’s death was an accident! The police report—"
"The police report was written by Chief Inspector Callahan," Nico interrupted smoothly. "A man whose daughter had her Harvard tuition paid by a trust fund registered in your name, Graham."
Graham swallowed hard.
Nico leaned forward, placing his hands flat on the table on either side of the firearm. "I’m going to give you one chance, Graham. One. If you tell me the absolute truth right now, you walk out of this house alive and spend the rest of your life in a federal prison. If you lie to me again... you don't leave this room."
Bruno Viscari suddenly scoffed. "Don't sell us out, Graham! He’s bluffing! He won't kill his own cousin and his chief counsel in the middle of the estate with staff upstairs!"
Nico didn't look away from Graham. He reached down and clicked the safety off the pistol with a sharp, echoing clack.
"Three seconds, Graham," Nico said. "One."
"It was Bruno!" Graham blurted out frantically, pointing an unsteady finger at Nico’s cousin. "It was Bruno! I swear to God, Nico! I just drafted the financial papers! I never wanted anyone to get hurt!"
"You snitch!" Bruno roared, lunging across the table toward Graham.
Before Bruno could reach the attorney, Nico stood up, raised the heavy pistol, and cracked the steel barrel across Bruno’s jaw. The impact echoed like a gunshot. Bruno collapsed back into his leather chair, blood spurting from his broken lip, clutching his face in pain.
Nico didn't even lose his breath. He adjusted his cuffs and lowered the weapon back toward Graham.
"Continue, Graham," Nico commanded cold-bloodedly.
Graham was trembling violently now, sweat dripping down his temples. "Audra... she caught us reviewing the secondary offshore ledgers in the library three years ago. She realized Bruno was skimming millions from the port union. She told us she was going to take the physical hard drives directly to you that night."
"And?"
"We couldn't let her do that!" Graham sobbed. "If you found out, you would have buried us both! Bruno called his contact at the port—a mechanic named Vance. They tampered with the brake fluid lines on Audra’s Mercedes while she was inside packing her bag."
Nico’s heart felt as though it had been pierced by an iron spike. The memory of that night flooded back in horrific detail: Audra rushing out of the driveway in her silver sedan, the sudden rainstorm, the phone call two hours later from the highway patrol informing him that her car had failed to make the turn at the Harbor Nine cliffs.
All this time, he had believed she was angry at him. All this time, he believed she was fleeing his coldness.
She wasn't running from him. She was running to him, carrying the evidence to save him, and the men he trusted had cut her brakes.
A deep, terrible fury awakened inside Nico Viscari—a darkness he had kept buried since his father’s death a decade ago.
"Where is the hard drive she took from the safe?" Nico asked, his voice deathly quiet.
"It... it wasn't in her car when it went off the cliff," Graham stammered. "We searched the wreckage before the police arrived. The hard drive was missing. We assumed she dropped it somewhere in the house before she fled!"
Nico remembered Mara’s words: She gave me her old burner phone and told me she had saved a voice recording and a digital master key on it.
The master key wasn't a physical object. It was a digital encryption file stored inside the memory card of the cracked blue phone currently sitting upstairs in little Elsie’s hands.
Nico slowly turned his attention to the other lieutenants—Sal and Dominic—who were trembling in their seats.
"Which of you knew about the brakes?" Nico asked them.
"We didn't know, Boss!" Sal cried, placing his hands flat on the table in surrender. "We swear on our mothers' graves! We knew Graham and Bruno were setting up offshore accounts, but we thought Audra’s crash was a tragic accident! We would never touch your wife, Nico! Never!"
Nico studied Sal’s eyes for five agonizing seconds, searching for a trace of deceit. Seeing none, he turned back to Marco, who had re-entered the room.
"Marco."
"Yes, Boss?"
"Disarm Sal and Dominic. Put them in the basement holding cells until I decide what to do with them."
"Understood."
"And Bruno and Graham?" Marco asked, gesturing to the bleeding cousin and the sweating lawyer.
May you like
Nico looked at the two men who had murdered his wife and stolen his peace for three long years.
"Take them to the boathouse at Harbor Nine," Nico said coldly. "We’re going to have a final meeting at the exact spot where Audra’s car went into the water."
