Chapter 5 - THE SHADOW WAR
By sunrise, the Chicago underworld was bleeding. Celeste’s botched assassination attempt had fractured the delicate peace between the Moretti syndicate and the Vane dynasty. The news reported a "gas leak" at The Obsidian, but everyone on the streets knew the truth.
Evelyn remained confined to the penthouse, surrounded by heavily armed guards. She couldn't sleep. Instead, she found herself at the massive dining table, sifting through the encrypted financial ledgers Lorenzo had casually left open on a laptop. Numbers had always made sense to her. It was how she tracked her father's debts.
When Lorenzo walked in, freshly showered and smelling of sandalwood and cordite, he found her furiously typing.
"You're shifting your assets wrong," she said without looking up. "The Vanes are tracking your offshore accounts through a shell company in the Caymans. If you move the money now, they’ll freeze it via their federal judges."
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Lorenzo stopped dead in his tracks. He leaned over her shoulder, his proximity sending a shiver down her spine. "Show me."
For the next four hours, the waitress dismantled the mob boss's financial vulnerabilities. She rerouted millions through decentralized chains that the Vanes couldn't touch. Lorenzo watched her, his admiration growing into something far more dangerous than gratitude.
