Chapter 7 - THE MASTER’S RETURN
It was half past midnight when the heavy mahogany doors of the private study finally swung open.
Nico stepped out into the dark corridor, stretching his broad shoulders against the tailored fabric of his black suit jacket. His dark wavy hair was slightly mussed from hours of leaning over blueprints and balance sheets, and a faint shadow of stubble lined his chiseled jaw. His dark eyes, though tired, carried the sharp, arrogant satisfaction of a man who had spent the last four hours systematically dismantling a rival logistics syndicate’s expansion into Northern New Jersey.
Behind him, Arthur walked slowly, tucking a leather ledger beneath his arm, his scarred face unreadable.
“We finalize the port contracts at noon tomorrow,” Nico said, his baritone voice echoing off the paneled walls. “Tell the team to have the paperwork notarized before the banks open.”
“Already handled,” Arthur replied, his voice rough. He stopped at the head of the gallery, his sharp eyes glancing down the empty hallway toward the kitchen. “The tray is on the island.”
Nico glanced over, noticing the silver serving tray resting on the dark marble counter, the crystal glasses of water long since warm, the ice completely melted.
“She probably went to bed early,” Nico said, waving his hand with casual dismissiveness. “Norah gets dramatic when the meetings run past ten. She’ll leave coffee on the counter in the morning and pretend she was never annoyed.”
Arthur looked at the untouched fruit on the tray, then looked at Nico, a faint, skeptical furrow forming between his brows. “She didn't come back to clear the glasses, Nico.”
“She’s sleeping, Arthur,” Nico chuckled, adjusting the gold cufflinks on his wrists as he turned toward the private master suite. “Get some rest. I’ll see you at nine.”
Arthur paused for a second longer, watching his boss’s broad back retreat down the hall, before turning toward the private guest quarters.
Nico pushed open the heavy double doors of the master bedroom.
The room was pitch black, illuminated only by the cold, pale glow of the Manhattan skyline spilling through the floor-to-ceiling glass walls.
Nico unbuttoned his suit jacket as he walked in, tossing it onto the leather bench at the foot of the bed. “Norah?”
Silence answered him.
Not the quiet of a sleeping woman—not the soft, rhythmic sound of gentle breathing or the rustle of down sheets.
It was a dead, hollow silence. The kind of silence that exists only in an abandoned room where the air has stopped moving.
Nico’s hand froze on his collar.
His eyes swept the platform bed. The heavy charcoal linen duvet was pulled completely tight, smooth and unwrinkled, the pillows plumped and undisturbed. The bedside lamp was switched off. The glass of water she always kept on her nightstand was missing.
Nico frowned, a sudden, inexplicable prickle of unease brushing against the back of his neck.
He walked around the bed and looked down at the floor near the entrance to the dressing room.
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The shoe rack was visible in the faint ambient light from the city.
The rows of designer heels and Italian loafers sat in immaculate order, but on the bottom shelf, in the exact spot where her scuffed brown leather boots had sat for three years, there was only a rectangular patch of empty wood.
