Chapter 3 - Interrogation in the Dark
The basement of the Moretti estate was nothing like the glittering ballrooms above. It was cool, damp, and smelled faintly of old stone and unyielding concrete.
Julian Vance sat strapped to a heavy iron chair beneath the harsh glare of a single overhead bulb. His breathing was shallow, his broken knee throbbing with a dull, sickening ache.
Alessandro stood in the shadows just beyond the light, watching through a one-way mirror as Marco paced around the prisoner, tossing a heavy steel wrench from hand to hand.
“Let’s try this again, Julian,” Marco said, his voice entirely devoid of emotion. “Who paid you? Was it the Rossi family? Or did someone closer to home buy your loyalty?”
Julian spat blood onto the concrete. “I told you... I act alone. I wanted out of the syndicate’s pocket. You people destroy everything you touch.”
“A corporate auditor develops a sudden desire to blow up his boss with military-grade C-4?” Alessandro’s voice echoed through the intercom speakers, filling the small interrogation room. “Unlikely. People like you don't risk the electric chair for ideology. You do it for greed, or because you’re being blackmailed.”
Julian flinched at the word blackmailed.
In the observation room, Alessandro noticed the micro-expression instantly. He pressed the intercom button again.
“Who has dirt on you, Julian? Is it gambling debts? Embezzlement from the Romano shipping accounts? Or did someone hand you the flash drive and promise you a new life in Zurich if you framed Miss Romano?”
Julian’s eyes darted toward the camera lens behind the mirror. For a split second, panic flickered across his beaten face.
“You don't know who you’re messing with,” Julian whispered, his voice trembling. “She’s not just some ordinary socialite, Moretti. The person pulling the strings... they own half the city council. They own your shipping lanes. They’ve been inside your perimeter for months.”
“Name. Her.” Alessandro growled, his fist slamming against the steel console.
“I can’t,” Julian choked out, a sudden look of sheer terror washing over his features. “If I talk, they’ll—argh!”
Before Julian could finish his sentence, a sudden, sharp hiss filled the interrogation room.
A tiny puff of gray smoke vented from the air intake vent near the ceiling.
“Gas!” Marco yelled, instantly drawing his weapon and lunging toward the door.
“Marco, get him out!” Alessandro roared, sprinting out of the observation room toward the heavy steel security door of the basement.
Too late.
Before Marco could reach the chair, Julian’s body seized violently. His eyes rolled back into his head, black foam bubbling from his lips. The auditor slumped forward, the heavy leather straps catching his dead weight as the odorless, tasteless neurotoxin did its work in mere seconds.
Alessandro slammed his weight against the exterior door, bursting into the room just as the ventilation system whined, sucking the remaining gas back into the sealed ducts.
Marco coughed, waving his hand in front of his face. “Poison. Someone on the security detail overrode the master filtration system.”
Alessandro knelt beside Julian’s lifeless body. The auditor’s eyes were wide and sightless, locked in a permanent expression of ultimate betrayal.
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Someone inside the Moretti compound had just murdered their only lead.
Which meant the traitor wasn't just close to Alessandro—they had administrative access to the estate’s most secure systems.
