Chapter 2 - THE COMPASS OF LIES
“Osprey Holdings,” Dominic Russo repeated.
His voice was a low, resonant rumble inside the soundproofed interior of the black sedan. Outside, the Manhattan rain hammered against the tinted windows, blurring the streetlights into streaks of gold and red.
I was still shivering on the floorboards. The silk of my wedding gown was soaked with rainwater and street grime. The blood from my scraped knees had soaked through the delicate tulle. I had spent the last twenty-seven minutes sprinting down concrete fire stairs, slipping through the hotel kitchens, and throwing myself into the first idling black car I found in the VIP garage.
I hadn’t known it was his.
I just knew I had to disappear before Liam found me.
“You know the name,” I whispered, my voice trembling.
Dominic didn’t move to help me up. He sat in the leather seat above me, a shadow in a tailored charcoal suit. The same suit he had been wearing in the hotel library.
“Everyone in my circle knows that name right now,” Dominic said smoothly. “Five million dollars vanished from my accounts at dawn. The wire trace stopped at a Delaware shell company registered forty-eight hours ago. Osprey Holdings.”
I swallowed hard. The air in the car felt too thin.
“I didn't steal your money,” I said, forcing myself to look directly into his dark, assessing eyes. “Liam did. He gave me the paperwork ten minutes before the ceremony. He told me it was a prenuptial agreement.”
Dominic studied my face. He looked at my ruined dress, my bare, bleeding feet, and the torn veil pooling around my shoulders. He was a man who traded in human desperation. He knew what a liar looked like.
And he knew I wasn't one.
“He made you the managing member,” Dominic stated. It wasn't a question.
“Yes. To hold the bag when you came looking.”
Dominic leaned forward. The streetlights caught the sharp angles of his jaw. “And yet, you didn't sign it. You ran.”
“Because I read it.” I pulled myself up slightly, wincing as the ripped silk pulled against my knees. “I coordinate heavy freight logistics for a living, Mr. Russo. I read contracts every day of my life. I know what a liability trap looks like.”
For a fraction of a second, the corner of Dominic’s mouth twitched. A ghost of a smile.
“Competence,” he murmured. “A rare trait in this city.”
He reached over and tapped the glass partition separating us from the driver.
“Drive, Marcus,” Dominic ordered.
The heavy engine purred. The car pulled out into the chaotic Manhattan traffic.
Panic spiked in my chest. “Where are you taking me? I need to go to the police. I need to report the fraud.”
“You go to the police, and you’ll be dead before midnight,” Dominic said flatly. “Liam Foster handles legitimate investment portfolios for half the precinct captains in this borough. If you walk into a station, Liam will know before you finish spelling your name at the front desk.”
“He’s an investment banker,” I argued, though my voice lacked conviction. I had heard Liam kissing Samantha. I had heard the coldness in his voice when he talked about me holding the bag.
“He is a parasite,” Dominic corrected. “A parasite who just stole from the wrong host.”
Dominic reached into the console between the seats. He didn't pull out a gun. He pulled out a clean, monogrammed linen handkerchief and dropped it onto my lap.
“Clean your knees. You’re ruining the upholstery.”
I grabbed the handkerchief, pressing it against my bleeding skin. The casual cruelty of the comment stung, but it grounded me. Emotion wasn't going to get me out of this car alive. Logic was.
“Why are you helping me?” I asked, applying pressure to the cuts. “If Liam stole your money and framed me, why not just hand me over to your people to make an example of me?”
Dominic leaned back into the shadows. “Because killing you doesn't retrieve my five million dollars. Liam locked that money in a digital escrow. The only way it moves is with the signature of the managing member of Osprey Holdings.”
I froze. “But I didn't sign the paperwork.”
“Liam doesn't know that yet,” Dominic said softly.
Answer One: Dominic wasn't holding me hostage for revenge. He needed me alive to play the part of the managing member to bait Liam.
Open Two: Why would Liam choose a company name connected to my dead father? And why was Dominic sitting in the hotel library in the first place?
“Osprey,” I whispered, looking down at the gold embroidery on my torn veil. “My father’s boat was named Osprey. That can’t be a coincidence. Liam chose that name to mock me.”
Dominic went completely still.
He looked at the veil. Then he looked at me, his eyes suddenly narrowing with intense scrutiny.
“Your father,” Dominic said carefully. “Arthur Davis.”
My head snapped up. “How do you know my father’s name?”
Dominic didn't answer immediately. He opened the glove compartment and reached inside. When his hand emerged, he was holding a heavy, scratched brass compass.
The air vanished from my lungs.
I knew that compass. It had sat on my father’s desk in his home office for twenty years. I used to trace the glass casing when I was a little girl. It had gone missing the week after his funeral.
“Where did you get that?” I demanded, reaching for it.
Dominic pulled it out of my reach.
“Your father wasn't just a simple freight coordinator, Chloe,” Dominic said, his voice surprisingly gentle. “Arthur Davis was my chief logistics smuggler for fifteen years. He moved my product. And he was the best I ever had.”
Reversal: My blue-collar, hardworking father hadn't been an innocent civilian. He had been a high-level operative for the most dangerous crime family in New York.
I stared at the brass compass in Dominic’s hands, my entire worldview shattering into jagged pieces.
“You’re lying,” I choked out. “My father hated criminals. He worked twelve-hour shifts at the docks to pay for my college.”
“He worked those shifts for me,” Dominic said. “And he did it to keep you insulated.”
Dominic flipped the heavy brass compass over. He pressed his thumb against a hidden latch near the hinge. With a soft click, the back plate popped open.
There was a hollow compartment inside.
Dominic reached in and pulled out a small, laminated yellow card.
It was a baggage claim ticket. Penn Station.
May you like
He held it out to me.
“Your father gave me this compass the day before his heart attack,” Dominic said, his eyes never leaving mine. “He told me that if Liam Foster ever tried to hurt you, this claim ticket would burn his entire life to the ground.”
