Chapter 10 - Julian Vance
The Marina was cloaked in a thick, suffocating fog when I arrived at 11:45 PM. The docks were deserted, the only sound the rhythmic sloshing of the dark water against the wooden pylons. I wore a heavy trench coat, my hands buried deep in my pockets. My right hand was tightly gripping a can of industrial pepper spray; my left hand held the silver skeleton key.
I hadn't called Hayes. If this man could breach my secure condo and bypass federal alarms, he could easily follow through on his threat to harm the prosecutor's family. I had to face him myself.
"You're remarkably punctual for someone walking into a trap," a voice drifted through the fog.
A tall man stepped out from the shadows of a luxury yacht. He was dressed in an impeccably tailored charcoal suit, looking entirely out of place on the damp, freezing docks. His face was sharp, aristocratic, and completely devoid of empathy. His eyes were the color of slate.
"My name is Julian Vance," he said, stopping a few feet away from me. "I apologize for the mess at your condo. Finding good contractors is so difficult these days."
"You're Adrian's shadow investor," I said, my voice surprisingly steady. "The eighty million dollars."
Julian laughed softly. "Eighty million? Please. That was just the operational slush fund. Adrian Caldwell was laundering nearly half a billion dollars of my syndicate's money through his real estate empire. When you heroically brought him down, you froze my capital."
"I don't care about your capital," I spat back. "I have the key. Take it and leave me alone."
I held out the silver key. Julian didn't reach for it. Instead, he smiled—a cold, predatory expression that made my blood run cold.
"You misunderstand our dynamic," Julian said smoothly. "I don't just want the key. I want the cipher box it opens. And unfortunately for both of us, Adrian hid the box in a highly secure, private bank vault in Geneva. A vault that can only be accessed by the registered account holder."
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"I am not the account holder," I said, taking a step back.
"Oh, but you are," Julian smirked, pulling a folded document from his jacket pocket and tossing it at my feet. "Adrian forged your signature on the corporate documents before you left him. Legally speaking, you are the sole proprietor of the offshore account holding my cipher. You and I are going to Switzerland."
