Chapter 6 - "WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"
Adrian didn't turn his head immediately. But his peripheral vision, honed by decades of paranoia and street war, caught the faint, subtle shift of dark wool against the doorframe.
Slowly—deliberately—Adrian rotated his broad shoulders. His dark eyes shifted away from the filigree key in his palm, tracking across the threshold of his office, locking squarely onto the back of the man attempting to slip away into the hallway.
"Where are you going, Dominic?" Adrian asked.
The words weren't shouted. They were delivered with a calm, flat, knife-like precision that seemed to physically freeze the air in the corridor.
Dominic stopped instantly.
His back remained turned to the office for two long, agonizing seconds. His shoulders were hunched, his hands clenched into tight fists at his sides, his breath coming in loud, ragged hitches that echoed in the quiet hallway.
The four other lieutenants standing near the door turned to look at Dominic in utter confusion.
"Dominic?" one of them asked, reaching out a hand toward his shoulder. "What's wrong with you?"
Dominic slowly turned back around to face the office. His face was slick with a sudden, cold sweat, his eyes darting frantically from Adrian’s unthinking glare to the tiny girl standing in the center of the room holding her mother's hand.
Adrian took two heavy steps toward the doorway, the second brass key held firmly between his thumb and forefinger.
"You recognized it," Adrian said softly, stepping over the shattered coffee cups on the floor. "You didn't care about four-seventeen. But the filigree key... you know exactly what door that belongs to, don't you?"
Dominic swallowed hard, his throat making a dry, clicking sound. "Adrian... Boss... please. I’ve been loyal to your father and to you for thirty years. You know me—"
"I thought I knew everyone in this room," Adrian interrupted, his voice dropping into a dark, terrifying register. "Marcus. Lock the main gates. Nobody leaves the estate."
Marcus didn't hesitate. He pulled a sleek black radio from his inner coat pocket and spoke three sharp words into the grill: "Lockdown. Code Red."
Outside the mansion, the distant, heavy thud of electronic steel gates slamming shut echoed across the manicured lawns.
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Mia looked up from her mother’s skirt, her big brown eyes moving between the tall, scary man sweating by the door and Adrian’s dark, furious face.
"Mommy," Mia whispered, holding her pink dress. "Why is the old key making everyone sad again?"
