The night I found my brother’s killer, I was carrying a three-thousand-dollar bottle of whisky on a silver tray.

The air in the VIP mezzanine was heavier, warmer, and smelled distinctly of expensive tobacco and cedarwood. Downstairs, the bass from the house speakers vibrated through the floorboards like a steady heartbeat, but up here, the sound was muted, muffled by acoustic panels disguised as modern art.

I kept my head down, my posture deferential, adopting the standard-issue servant shuffle that made people look right through you. To everyone in this room, I was just the help carrying an overpriced bottle of amber poison.

“Leave it on the credenza,” a voice murmured.

It wasn't Julian Vance. It was one of his shadows—a massive wall of a man with a broken nose and a tailored suit that couldn't quite conceal the holster beneath his left arm. His name was Dante, and he spent his entire life looking for threats that never came from where he expected.

“The bottle requires a specific pour, sir,” I said, my voice carefully flat, practiced, stripped of any emotion that might make someone turn around and look at my face. “Management’s instructions. If it’s exposed to room temperature for more than three minutes before breathing, the flavor profile shifts.”

Dante grunted, waving a thick hand dismissively. “Make it quick. He’s busy.”

I stepped past him, moving toward the low mahogany table where four men sat around a green felt layout. Piles of black and purple chips sat stacked beside crystal highball glasses. At the center of the table sat Julian Vance.

Even seated, he commanded the room like gravity. He wore a charcoal button-down with the top two buttons undone, revealing pale skin and the dark edge of an old scar slicing toward his collarbone. His hair was black, brushed back carelessly, with sharp silver wings at the temples that caught the amber light of the table lamp. He wasn't looking at his cards. He was looking at a digital tablet displaying corporate acquisition charts, his expression a mask of absolute, terrifying boredom.

I set the crystal decanter down beside his elbow. My fingers grazed the edge of the table.

That was when it happened.

The small, leather-bound diary slipped from my apron pocket, hitting the thick wool rug with a soft, muffled thud.

I froze. My breath caught in my throat, a sharp spike of pure adrenaline flooding my veins.

For a second, nobody moved. The poker game paused. One of the junior partners across the table looked down, frowning at the worn, black-leather notebook lying near his custom leather shoes.

I dropped down instantly, moving with calculated panic, reaching for the book before anyone else could touch it. “I am so sorry, sir, my apologies, let me just—”

A large, scarred hand closed over the book first.

It wasn't Dante’s hand.

It was Julian Vance’s.

His fingers were long, pale, and steady. He lifted the diary off the floor effortlessly, his dark eyes shifting slowly from the financial charts on his tablet down to the object in his grip.

The leather cover was scuffed at the corners. A yellow sticky note was wedged halfway out of the pages, bearing a string of alphanumeric routing codes that didn't belong to any cocktail recipe.

My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. If he opened it—if he read even a single line of what I had written about the Crimson Lounge, about the shell companies, about Leo—it wouldn't just blow my cover. It would end my life before the clock struck one.

“Excuse me, sir,” I whispered, keeping my eyes fixed on the plush rug, forcing my voice to remain steady. “That’s... personal.”

Julian didn't move. He didn't hand it back. Slowly, deliberately, he tilted the book toward the light of the table lamp, his thumb resting against the worn spine.

“Personal,” Julian repeated, his voice a low, gravelly baritone that felt less like speech and more like stones grinding together in the dark. “In my club, staff aren't supposed to carry personal property during service. It’s a distraction.”

“I’ll take it back, and it won't happen again,” I said, my fingers curling into the fabric of my apron, fighting every instinct screaming at me to snatch it from his grip and run.

Julian didn't look at my face. He looked at the diary. Then, slowly, with maddening composure, he slid his thumb under the front cover and flipped it open to the bookmarked page near the back.

The room went completely dead silent. Even the ambient bass from downstairs seemed to fade away.

Julian’s eyes scanned the handwritten ink on the page. I watched his expression closely, waiting for the flicker of recognition, the sudden tightening of his jaw, the command to Dante to drag me out into the alley.