CHAPTER 2

Liam turned and walked away. He didn't watch the needle go in. He walked toward the large rolling door at the far end of the warehouse, his footsteps measured and sure.

He heard a final, choked gasp behind him. Then silence. The only sound was the rain.

He reached the door and pushed it open. The cold, wet night air hit his face. A black sedan idled by the curb, exhaust smoking in the drizzle. His driver, Aris, stood ready by the back door.

Liam didn't look back. He slid into the leather seat. The door closed with a soft, solid thud, sealing him in quiet.

A moment later, the front passenger door opened and Kaela got in. She placed the medical case on the floor. Viktor took the wheel from Aris, who got in the back with Liam. The car pulled away smoothly.

No one spoke.

Liam looked out the window at the city sliding by the glimmer of wet streets, the blur of neon signs, the dark hulks of buildings. Veridia Bay. His kingdom. A kingdom built on a code designed to keep the rot at bay. A code one man had just died for.

It didn't feel like victory. It felt like maintenance. Like pulling weeds that would never stop growing. "The sister?" Liam asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Unaware, “Kaela said from the front, checking her phone. "The scholarship fund disbursement for next semester was approved this afternoon, as scheduled. She posted a picture of her new textbooks online three hours ago."

Liam nodded. The code was upheld. The guilty were punished. The innocent people were protected. It was clean. It was correct.

So why did the hollow place inside his chest feel so vast?

Twenty minutes later, the car entered the underground garage of the AETHELGARD Tower. The elevator was private, keyed to his penthouse. It rose in a silent, swift glide.

The doors opened directly into his home.

It was not a home. It was a space. A magnificent, cold, empty space. Floor to ceiling windows showed a panoramic view of the night city and the dark sea beyond. The walls were bare, polished concrete. The furniture was modern, minimalist, and looked untouched. There was a grand piano, a black Steinway, in the corner by the windows. It was the only thing in the room that seemed to have a soul.

He shrugged off his overcoat. Aris, silent as a shadow, took it and disappeared toward the closet.

Liam walked to the window. He looked down at the city, at the countless lights, the countless lives. He felt nothing. He was a king in a glass tower, ruling over a world that slept soundly only because of the terrible, quiet decisions he made in the dark.

His phone buzzed in his pocket.

He didn't need to look to know who it was. Only one person called this late. Only one person was persistent enough to call after being ignored all day.

Sophia.

He let it ring. The vibration was an insectile hum against his thigh.

He pictured her: perfect Sophia. Artfully tousled honey-blonde hair. Pouty lips always glossed. Eyes that calculated the value of everything they saw. She was beautiful the way a luxury car was beautiful-all sleek lines and expensive finish, with a cold engine underneath.

She had been a distraction. A beautiful, amusing companion for events and dinners. A woman who understood the appearance of his world. But in the last few months, her touches had become clingier.

Her questions about the future more pointed. She had started talking about redecorating the penthouse, about turning a guest room into a nursery. As if testing the waters. The phone stopped buzzing. A second later, a text notification chimed. He finally pulled the phone out.

Sophia: You're ignoring me. I waited at the restaurant for an hour. We need to talk about tonight. Call me.

He deleted the text. He placed the phone on the cold marble counter of the kitchen island. He walked to the piano.

He sat on the bench. He didn't turn on a light. The city's glow provided just enough illumination. He lifted the fallboard. The ivory keys were pale in the dimness.

He didn't play often. Music was a vulnerability. It was a truth. He couldn't lie with Chopin. His fingers found their starting positions, hovering over the keys.

Then he played.

The notes of Debussy's Clair de Lune filled the vast, empty space. They were gentle, melancholy, full of a longing so profound it was like a physical ache. The music wrapped around him, a stark contrast to the brutal clinicality of the warehouse. This was the man inside the kingpin. The lonely boy who hated his father. The man who craved something clean, something beautiful, something that wasn't tainted by blood or money or codes.

He played for ten minutes. The world outside the windows ceased to exist. There was only the piano, the music, and the hollow space inside him that the notes seemed to echo in, making it feel even larger.

When the final note faded into silence, he let his hands rest in his lap. The connection was severed. The kingpin returned.

His phone buzzed again on the counter. A relentless, angry sound.

He didn't move. He stared at his reflection in the dark window-a silhouette of a man in a ten-million- dollar cage.

Sophia's desperation repelled him. It was a mirror held up to his own emptiness, and he didn't like what it showed. She wanted the power, the money, the title of being his woman. She didn't want the man who played lonely music in the dark. She didn't want the man who ensured a traitor's sister could buy her textbooks.

He was a king. He was a monster. He was a man.

And he was utterly, completely alone.

The phone finally stopped buzzing.

In the quiet, the echo of Marcus's final gasp seemed to linger in the air, mixing with the ghost of the piano's song. Two sounds from two different worlds, both owned by the same man.

He had upheld the code today. He had done the right, terrible thing.

Tomorrow, there would be another problem. Another decision. Another weed to pull.

He closed the piano lid. The soft click was the sound of a vault sealing.

He stood, leaving the bench and the view behind, and walked toward his sterile bedroom. The night awaited, long and silent. The city slept, unaware of the price paid for its peace.