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

The rain fell harder now, washing the grit and blood from the concrete floor of the parking structure as we descended the interior ramp toward bay twelve.

Julian’s private armored Maybach sat idling in the shadows, its headlights cutting amber beams through the wet mist. The driver’s door opened automatically as we approached, but Julian didn't get in immediately. He turned to face me beside the passenger door, his dark eyes searching my face in the dim light.

“Your hand is bleeding,” Julian noted quietly.

I looked down. My palm was scraped raw from the grip of the Smith & Wesson, the rain washing away the faint smear of gunpowder and blood. I hadn't even felt it.

“I’ll live,” I said, my voice steady.

Julian reached into his inner coat pocket and pulled out a clean white handkerchief, offering it to me. I took it, pressing it against my palm.

“Dante?” I asked, the anxiety finally breaking through my armor. “On the stairs... there were too many of them.”

Julian’s expression hardened for a fraction of a second before he nodded. “Dante’s a professional. He knows how to clear a stairwell and meet us at the rendezvous point. He’s already headed for the safehouse.”

As if on cue, a dark SUV pulled smoothly out of the adjacent row, stopping beside the Maybach. Dante rolled down the passenger window, looking slightly battered with a bloody lip, but grinning like a shark. “All clear, Boss. Rear guard neutralized. The city police are finally responding to our anonymous tip about Victor’s warehouse operation.”

Julian let out a slow breath, his shoulders relaxing an inch. He turned back to me.

“You have the book?” Julian asked.

I reached into my skirt pocket, pulling out the scuffed, leather-bound diary. The pages were slightly damp from the rain, but the ink remained intact—every routing number, every signature, every piece of evidence Leo had died trying to protect.

I held it out to him.

Julian looked at the book for a long moment. Then, instead of taking it, he gently pushed my hand back toward my chest.

“Keep it,” Julian said.

“Keep it?” I frowned. “This is what Victor wants. This is the leverage you need to take him down.”

“It’s your evidence, Sofia,” Julian said, his voice softening, the cold edge melting away to reveal something deeper, something profoundly human beneath the armor of the Ghost of the Loop. “You carried it through hell tonight. Use it to finish what your brother started. Tomorrow morning, my legal team will escort you to the federal prosecutor’s office. Victor’s accounts will be frozen before the sun comes up. And my cousin will spend the rest of his natural life behind bars.”

I stared down at the small black book in my hands. The pages felt lighter now—not because the weight of the past had vanished, but because I was no longer carrying it alone.

“And you?” I asked, looking up into his dark eyes. “What happens to the Crimson Lounge?”

“Management is going to need a new head bartender,” Julian replied with a faint, ghost of a smile. “One who actually knows how to pour a proper drink without staring into the middle distance.”

I let out a real, genuine laugh—the first one I had allowed myself in six agonizing months.

Julian opened the passenger door of the Maybach for me, shielding my head with his hand as I slid into the warm leather interior. He closed the door, walked around to the driver’s side, and slid behind the wheel.

As the armored car glided out of the parking structure and merged into the rainy Chicago traffic, I looked down at the diary one last time, turned to the final page, and closed the cover.