Chapter 8 - The Man Above the King
The first clue came from Tony Valente’s autopsy.
He hadn’t been killed because he knew too much.
He had been killed because he had started talking.
Three hours before his death, Tony had called an unlisted number seventeen times.
Marco traced it to an office inside the Federal Building.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Malcolm Pierce.
The same prosecutor who had offered to receive Dominic’s evidence.
The same man whose team had supposedly arranged the transport.
Riley stared at the photograph.
“He was your father’s attorney?”
“No. His father was.”
Dominic understood the mistake.
They had trusted a family name.
Exactly as Riley had once been expected to fear his.
Pierce had inherited more than his father’s profession.
He had inherited his secrets.
The fifth man in Thomas’s photograph had been Victor Crane.
But the photograph had been cropped.
Marco recovered the original negative from the warehouse.
There were six men.
The sixth was Henry Pierce.
Malcolm’s father.
“The Five Keep Quiet,” Riley murmured.
Dominic understood.
“Because Lorenzo wasn’t one of the five.”
Lorenzo had discovered them.
Thomas had joined him.
The five conspirators were Crane, Valente, Benedetti, DeLuca, and Pierce.
Benedetti tried to leave.
The others killed him.
Years later, Salvatore killed Lorenzo.
Valente killed Thomas.
Now their children were inheriting consequences.
Riley shook her head.
“No.”
Dominic looked at her.
“No what?”
“We are not inheriting this.”
She pointed toward the evidence.
“They inherited it because they chose to continue it. We choose differently.”
Dominic stared at her.
Then smiled.
“What?”
“You’re very bossy.”
“You like it.”
“I’m beginning to.”
They needed proof against Pierce.
The stolen evidence was dangerous, but Marco had secretly copied the digital files.
Pierce didn’t know.
Riley had another advantage.
Tony’s murder.
The hospital surveillance had been manipulated remotely through a government cybersecurity terminal.
Marco traced the access.
Pierce.
But they needed enough to expose him before he could destroy them.
Dominic proposed leaking everything simultaneously to newspapers, federal oversight offices, state investigators, and defense attorneys.
Riley added one destination.
The public.
“You want to put organized-crime evidence online?”
“I want enough released that no single official can make it disappear.”
Dominic considered her.
“My father would have liked you.”
Riley looked down.
“Mine probably would have hated you.”
“Initially?”
“No. Consistently.”
Dominic laughed.
The release was scheduled for noon.
At 11:42, Riley disappeared.
Dominic discovered her phone on the kitchen counter.
Beside it sat her knife.
That frightened him more than blood would have.
Riley never went anywhere without it now.
Security footage showed her walking voluntarily into a parking garage.
A black SUV had waited.
She entered without resistance.
Dominic replayed the footage.
“Why?”
Marco zoomed in.
Riley was holding something.
A photograph.
They enhanced it.
A woman tied to a chair.
Dominic recognized her.
Martha Hayes.
Riley’s aunt.
The woman who had raised Riley after her mother died.
Pierce had found the one person Riley would surrender herself to protect.
Dominic called him.
Pierce answered immediately.
“Mr. Castelli.”
“If you hurt her—”
“You’ll what? Kill me?”
Pierce laughed.
“That would validate every argument I intend to make about you.”
“What do you want?”
“The copies.”
Dominic looked at Marco.
Pierce knew.
“All copies. Every backup. Every password.”
“And Riley?”
“Alive. Currently.”
Dominic closed his eyes.
“Where?”
Pierce named the unfinished luxury tower being constructed three blocks from Hayes Prime Cuts.
The redevelopment project.
Of course.
Dominic arrived alone.
At least, Pierce believed he did.
Riley sat on the thirty-fourth floor with her wrists bound.
Her aunt sat beside her.
Crane stood near the windows.
Pierce held a gun.
“You came,” Riley said.
Dominic almost smiled.
“You sound surprised.”
“I specifically told you not to.”
“When?”
“With my eyes in the parking-garage camera.”
“I interpreted that as ‘please bring several heavily armed friends.’”
Pierce struck Riley.
Dominic’s smile vanished.
“Do that again.”
Pierce pointed the gun at her.
“What?”
Dominic’s voice became quiet.
“Nothing.”
That frightened Pierce more.
“Laptop.”
Dominic placed it on the concrete.
“Delete the files.”
“I can.”
“Do it.”
Dominic typed.
A progress bar appeared.
Crane checked the screen.
“Deleting.”
Riley watched Dominic.
He was too calm.
She knew that expression now.
He was lying.
Pierce smiled.
“You know, your father had the same weakness.”
Dominic looked up.
“What weakness?”
“He believed loyalty could overcome leverage.”
“No.”
Dominic glanced at Riley.
“My father’s weakness was trusting men who mistook leverage for loyalty.”
The laptop beeped.
DELETION COMPLETE.
Pierce relaxed.
Dominic checked his watch.
12:00.
Every phone in the room vibrated.
Pierce frowned.
His screen filled with notifications.
Documents had been released to sixteen news organizations.
Copies had reached federal inspectors.
State prosecutors.
Internal Affairs.
Two senators’ oversight staffs.
And thousands of public users.
Pierce looked at Dominic.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
Dominic smiled.
“She did.”
Pierce turned toward Riley.
She shrugged despite the restraints.
“I scheduled it yesterday.”
Pierce raised the gun.
Dominic moved.
So did Riley.
She slammed her chair sideways into Pierce’s knees.
The gun fired into the ceiling.
Dominic crossed the room.
Crane ran toward the construction elevator.
Marco stepped out.
“Bad direction.”
Crane stopped.
Behind Marco stood federal agents from an independent task force Dominic had contacted through three separate attorneys.
Pierce lay on the floor.
Riley stood over him after freeing one hand against a sharp metal edge.
She picked up his gun.
Dominic approached.
“You okay?”
“He hit me.”
“I saw.”
“You look angry.”
“I am.”
“Try personal growth.”
He stared at her.
She smiled.
Dominic laughed.
Pierce looked between them as agents handcuffed him.
“You think this makes you clean, Castelli?”
Dominic’s laughter stopped.
“No.”
That answer silenced everyone.
“I think it makes me responsible for what I do next.”
Outside, news helicopters circled.
The Castelli empire was about to become national news.
Dominic knew investigators would come.
He might lose everything.
Riley walked beside him toward the elevator.
“You scared?”
“Yes.”
She took his hand.
“Good.”
He looked at her.
“You have a strange relationship with fear.”
“So do you.”
The elevator doors opened.
Before entering, Dominic glanced at the skyline.
For fifteen years, he had built power because he believed power made him safe.
Now he understood.
Power only gave a man more things he could be afraid to lose.
He looked at Riley.
For the first time, that thought didn’t frighten him.
Then Riley’s phone rang.
It was the hospital.
Her expression changed as she listened.
“What?”
She looked at Dominic.
“Dr. Valente woke up.”
Tony’s father had survived an apparent suicide attempt hours earlier.
May you like
And before investigators reached his room, he had asked for Riley by name.
“He says he knows what my father’s last words were.”
