Chapter 7: Navigating the Archives
The rows of metal cabinets stretched into the gloom like silent tombstones. Luca kept the flashlight beam low, sweeping it across the index labels affixed to the drawers: 1994-1999: Personnel; 2000-2005: Property Acquisition; 2006-2012: Settlements. My fingers grazed the cold metal as we moved past them, the silence broken only by the muffled, distant thump of bass from the charity gala taking place floors above us. Up there, wealthy donors were clinking crystal champagne flutes and smiling for society columnists, entirely oblivious to the underground investigation unravelling beneath their feet.
“Look for financial ledgers from two years ago,” Luca instructed, his eyes scanning the labels with laser focus. “Specifically accounts tied to external contractors and payroll adjustments.”
“You think they bought him off?” I asked, pulling open a heavy drawer that groaned in protest. Folders slipped and rustled inside, thick with yellowed paper and red ink stamps.
“I think Daniel was smart,” Luca replied, his voice tight. “Smart enough to know when something illegal was happening in the logistics division. If he threatened to walk away with proof, they wouldn't just give him a severance package. They’d bury him—or pay him to vanish.”
I flipped through a stack of payroll receipts, my breath catching in my throat as a familiar name caught my eye. Daniel Vance. The line item was marked with a handwritten asterisk and initialed by Uncle Victor, the family patriarch who had passed away under mysterious circumstances just months prior. Next to Daniel’s name was a disbursement figure that could buy a small house in the suburbs—followed by a second, much larger subtraction labeled Asset Relocation.
“Luca,” I breathed, pulling the folder out completely and stepping into the narrow aisle where the flashlight beam was brightest. “Look at this. They didn't just pay him off. They transferred his employment status to a shell company registered in the Caymans the exact week he supposedly ‘walked out’ to go to the coast.”
Luca stepped closer, his broad shoulders brushing against the metal shelving. He stared down at the document, his dark eyes narrowing as the final pieces of the puzzle locked into place. The righteous certainty he usually carried began to fracture, replaced by a cold, simmering fury. Before he could speak, however, a sharp metallic scrape echoed from the hallway outside the archive room.
Footsteps. Heavy, measured strides on the concrete floor.
May you like
“Someone’s coming,” I whispered, panic spiking in my chest.
Luca reacted instantly, grabbing my arm and pulling me behind a heavy stack of partitioned shelving just as the archive door swung open with a slow, ominous creak.
