Chapter 4 - SECRETS IN THE LEDGER
It was past midnight when the heavy oak door finally clicked open. Alessandro walked in, looking exhausted. He had shed his suit jacket, and his white button-down shirt was unfastened at the collar. He poured himself a glass of scotch from the crystal decanter on the desk, downing it in one swallow.
“She talked,” he said, his voice raw.
I stood up from the armchair, wrapping my cardigan tighter around myself. “Vivian?”
He nodded. “Her father orchestrated the alliance with the Vipers. They were planning to assassinate me at the wedding next month. They used the stuffed rabbit to smuggle a micro-USB drive past my security scanners. The drive was sewn inside the lining. It contains the patrol routes and security codes for the entire villa.”
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered.
He looked at me, his eyes piercing. “Don't be. Your daughter saved my life, Elena. But there is a problem. The drive requires a secondary decryption key, one Vivian claims she doesn't have.”
I hesitated. Before my husband died in a suspicious hit-and-run, leaving me buried in debt, I had been a forensic accountant for a major Milan firm. I was used to looking at encrypted numbers.
“Show me,” I said.
Alessandro blinked, surprised, but he opened his laptop. For the next hour, I sat beside the most dangerous man in Italy, staring at a wall of code. The proximity to him was electric. I could feel the heat radiating from his arm.
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“It’s not a digital key,” I said finally, pointing at the repeating sequence. “It’s an old financial cipher. A routing number. Vivian’s father used his offshore Cayman account number to lock it. I used to audit these types of accounts.”
Alessandro stared at me, a slow, predatory smile spreading across his face. “You are full of surprises, little bird.”
