Read Chapter 24: A Temporary Alliance

The safehouse smelled of salt and damp plaster, a ground-floor flat two streets back from the port that Pascal had tossed them like a bone to a dog. Alex pressed a rag against his shoulder, watching the harbor lights blink through the grimy window, and made the call he'd been dreading for six years.

The line rang four times. Five. On the sixth, a woman's voice answered, clipped and tired.

"Who is this?"

"Lea. It's Alex Renault."

Silence stretched. He counted the seconds in the throb of his shoulder wound.

"How did you get this number?" Lea's voice was hard, but he heard the tremor underneath. She'd been his rival's second-in-command for a decade—had watched him walk away from the life, then crawl back into it.

"Pascal Moreau. He owed me a favor. I need to talk to Nadia."

A bitter laugh crackled down the line. "Nadia doesn't take calls from men who burned her crew in Nice. You remember Nice, Alex? You remember walking out with the take and leaving her to eat the fallout?"

Zoe looked up from the table where she'd spread the ledger pages, her expression sharp. Alex shook his head—not now.

"I remember," he said. "And I remember why I walked. Viktor's men were closing in. If I'd stayed, we'd all be in the harbor."

"You were supposed to warn us."

"I was running for my life. There's a difference." He shifted, the chair creaking under him. "I'm not calling about old debts, Lea. I'm calling because Viktor Lacroix is leaving Monaco tomorrow night, and I need to know what he's carrying before he gets on that plane."

Another silence. This one felt different—heavier, like a door cracking open.

"Viktor," Lea repeated slowly. "The settlement king. The man who's had half the Riviera in his pocket since before you could count."

"The same."

"And why would Nadia care about Viktor Lacroix's travel plans?"

Alex closed his eyes. He'd rehearsed this a dozen ways on the walk over. Every version ended the same: with his cards on the table and nothing to hold back.

"Because I think he's got my brother. And I think he's had him for six years."

The words hung in the air. Zoe set down her pen, her face unreadable. Across the street, a truck rumbled past, shaking the glass in the windows.

"That's a big claim," Lea said finally.

"I've got a ledger that says it's true. I just can't read the damn thing without help."

"What kind of help?"

"The kind that involves someone who knows what Viktor's been hiding in his basement. Someone who's been tracking him longer than I have." He paused. "Someone like Nadia."

Lea was quiet so long Alex thought she'd hung up. Then she sighed, the sound carrying the weight of years.

"Stay where you are. She'll call you back in fifteen minutes. If you're lying, Alex—if this is some kind of play—"

"It's not."

"Then you've got fifteen minutes."

The line went dead.

Zoe was already standing, arms crossed. "Nadia Qadir? The woman who runs the Marseille crew? You're bringing her into this?"

"I'm not bringing her in. I'm asking her a question."

"She's a thief, Alex. A rival thief. You don't ask rival thieves questions without paying for the answer."

"I know what I'm doing." He said it more firmly than he felt, lowering himself into the chair by the window. His shoulder throbbed. His face burned where the laser had kissed him—a raw stripe down his jaw that had already started to blister.

Zoe studied him for a long moment, then turned back to the ledger. "You should let me look at that wound before you bleed out on Pascal's floor."

"Later."

"Alex—"

"I said later."

She didn't push. That was something, at least.

The call came in nine minutes later. Not from Lea's number—from a different one, encrypted, scrambled across three relay servers before it landed in his phone.

"Alex Renault." Nadia's voice was velvet over steel, the accent half-French, half-Lebanese. "You've got nerve calling me."

"I've got information," he said. "And I've got a problem you might want to help me solve."

"Help you? Last I checked, you owed me for the Nice job. You owed me for the Marseille job. You owe me for existing in the same hemisphere as my operation."

"I'm aware." He pressed the rag harder against his shoulder. "But this isn't about debt. This is about Viktor Lacroix and a man he's been hiding for six years. A man who was supposed to be dead."

The silence on the line was different from Lea's. It was the silence of a predator going still.

"Say that again."

"A man who was supposed to be dead. My brother, Marc. He died in a car crash in Lyon in 2019. Witness protection, they called it. Closed casket, no body, no funeral. Just a phone call and a death certificate." He swallowed. "Except Viktor's private plane is carrying a passenger tomorrow night. A passenger he's kept hidden for six years. And I think that passenger is my brother."

Nadia was quiet for a long moment. When she spoke, her voice was measured, careful.

"You're wrong about one thing."

"What's that?"

"Viktor's not carrying a passenger. He's carrying an asset. A witness." She paused. "Your brother didn't just fake his death to escape the syndicate, Alex. He faked his death to testify against it."

The room tilted. Alex gripped the armrest, the wound in his shoulder screaming.

"Testify," he repeated.

"Six years ago, Marc Renault was set to testify in a RICO case against the Lacroix organization. Viktor's people got to him first—or so everyone thought. The car crash was staged. The body was a John Doe pulled from a river. But instead of killing your brother, Viktor kept him alive. Locked him away somewhere no one could find him. And he's been using Marc's testimony as a bargaining chip ever since—insurance against the syndicate, leverage with the courts, a weapon he can point at anyone who crosses him."

Alex's mind raced. The ledger. Viktor's panic. The encrypted pages he couldn't decipher.

"The ledger," he said. "It's Marc's testimony. Viktor's been holding it as proof."

"Not proof. A key. The testimony is recorded—audio, video, sworn statements. Marc gave it to a lawyer before Viktor grabbed him. The ledger contains the lawyer's name and the location of the evidence." Nadia's voice hardened. "Viktor's been trying to get it back for six years. He's killed nine people trying to trace it. And now you've got it in your hands."

A cold sweat broke across Alex's forehead. His brother—his brother was alive. Locked in some hole Viktor had dug for him, waiting for a rescue that never came.

"Why are you telling me this?" His voice came out rough. "You could have let me walk into this blind."

"Because I want the same thing you want," Nadia said. "Viktor dead. The syndicate broken. And your brother free." She paused. "Also, I have a team in Monaco that's been watching Viktor's jet for three days. You're not the only one who figured out he's running. I just didn't know what he was carrying until now."

Alex heard what she wasn't saying. "You want the ledger."

"I want copies. The testimony goes to the courts. The ledger goes to me. You get your brother and your freedom."

"And Delacroix?" Alex asked. "The COO who's offered me immunity?"

"Delacroix is a snake. He wants the ledger to destroy it, not to save your brother. If you hand it to him, Marc dies in whatever hole Viktor's left him in, and you get a bullet for your trouble." Her voice dropped. "Work with me, Alex. We can end this tonight. Or you can trust the man who's been running Viktor's operation since before you were born."

Alex looked at Zoe. She'd been listening, her face pale in the dim light. She didn't say anything—just gave him a small nod.

"All right," he said. "I'm listening."

"Good." Nadia's voice was almost warm now. "You've got a safehouse. I've got a team. Send me your location. We move before sunrise."