Read Chapter 30: The Sting Setup

The medical bay at the port clinic smelled of antiseptic and salt. Jules lay on the examination table, shirt cut away, a field dressing half-soaked through with blood. The doctor—a wiry Algerian woman Zoe knew from a dozen smuggling jobs—worked fast, threading curved needles through Jules’s torn flesh while he gritted his teeth and stared at the ceiling.

Alex stood by the door, arm pressed against his side, feeling the warm spread of his own wound beneath the makeshift bandage. His vision had started to blur at the edges. Not yet, he told himself. Not until this was done.

“You’ll live,” the doctor said, snipping the suture line. “But if you move too fast for the next twelve hours, you’ll tear it open and bleed out in a gutter somewhere. I don’t do refunds.”

Jules let out a ragged laugh. “Comforting.”

Marco paced by the window, phone in hand, counting down. “Twenty-six minutes until the casino loop resets and Viktor’s people see the feed jump. We need a plan that doesn’t involve standing in one place.”

“We have one.” Alex stepped away from the door, swayed once, caught himself. “We hit him where his money lives.”

Zoe looked up from the corner where she’d been hunched over the ledger, its pages fanned open across a metal tray. “I found something. Buried in the file structure—encrypted subdirectory, timestamped every quarter for six years. Transaction records. Cleaned versions of what actually moved through Torrini’s sponsorship accounts.”

“Proof,” Jules said through his teeth as the doctor applied final tape. “The physical drive around Ostrowski’s neck has the only full-chain records. But what Zoe’s got on paper shows Viktor washed at least forty mil through fake engineering contracts and hospitality invoices.”

“And the payout structure,” Zoe added, tapping a column. “Every quarter, a bridge payment to a holding company in Vaduz. The residual goes to a numbered account that traces back through three shells to one name.”

Alex felt cold spread through his chest. “Viktor’s.”

“Direct deposits.” Zoe nodded. “Clean, traceable, and tied to the Torrini sponsorship contract that’s public record. If this gets out during the broadcast window, the race team cuts him loose within minutes. The syndicate does the same. No one keeps a partner whose laundering trail is smoking on live television.”

Marco stopped pacing. “You’re talking about burning him in public.”

“I’m talking about making him untouchable.” Alex’s voice had gone rough, but he held steady. “The syndicate doesn’t tolerate exposure. If we put this on a broadcast feed while the whole world watches the race, Viktor becomes a liability. They abandon him. They call off the hunt. And when he’s alone, I go through that east wing and find my mother.”

The room went quiet. Jules sat up slowly, wincing. “You’re not going through his estate alone.”

“You’re in no shape.” Alex shook his head. “Marco’s needed on the casino side to keep the feed locked. Zoe’s the only one who can decode the ledger fast enough to build the package. That leaves me.”

“Leaves you bleeding out.” Jules swung his legs off the table. “I can drive. I can shoot left-handed. I can stand watch while you go through the house.”

“You’ll tear—” the doctor started.

“Then you stitch me twice,” Jules said flatly. He looked at Alex. “You got me out of that hold. I’m not watching you walk into Viktor’s house alone on one lung and a prayer.”

Alex wanted to argue, but the argument caught in his throat. Jules was right. He was in no shape for a solo breach, and Viktor’s estate security would cut him down before he got within sight of the east wing windows.

“Fine,” Alex said. “But we do this in sequence. First, the broadcast package. Zoe, how long to assemble?”

She was already typing, fingers flying over a battered laptop. “The ledger’s encrypted files are all here. If I can shake loose the chain maps and the account numbers, I can build a side-by-side visual—Torrini’s public sponsorship numbers versus the actual money flow. Something a commentator could flash on screen during a pit stop.”

“We don’t need commentary,” Marco said. “We need to hijack the feed. Casino’s broadcast infrastructure runs through the same server farm that handles the in-venue screens. If I can get into the race-day transport matrix, I can inject whatever we want into the global feed for a solid thirty seconds before anyone kills it.”

“Thirty seconds is enough,” Alex said. “The internet does the rest.”

Jules pulled on a fresh shirt, moving carefully. “Ostrowski still has the physical drive. Even if we get the ledger files broadcast, the only copy of the complete chain—the one that ties Viktor to specific murders, not just laundering—is around his neck. We burn Viktor publicly, he goes underground. The drive gets buried with him.”

Alex looked at Zoe. “Any way to locate Ostrowski from the ledger’s metadata?”

She scanned deeper, downloading blocks of information. A long pause. “Maybe. There’s a regular handoff point timestamped to race weekend, every year for the past three. Standing appointment.”

“Where?”

“The tunnel under Turn Twelve.” Zoe’s voice had gone tight. “Paddock maintenance access. Ostrowski meets someone there an hour before the formation lap.”

“That’s where he gives up the drive,” Jules said slowly. “To Viktor’s courier.”

“Which means,” Alex said, “if we’re there first, we get the whole game in one piece.” The idea ignited beneath his ribs, pushing the pain of his shoulder to the margins. “We split. Zoe assembles the broadcast package remotely while Marco accesses the server farm. Jules and I take the tunnel.”

“It’s a trap waiting to happen,” Marco said.

“Everything’s a trap,” Alex said. “The difference is whether we spring it first or walk into it blind.”

He looked at the ledger’s open pages, at the neat columns of numbers that represented six years of Viktor’s secrets. Six years Luca had been held to protect this information. Six years, Alex had believed his brother was dead. And now, buried in the same encryption, his mother’s name.

There was something else, he realized. A pattern in the dates. The quarterly bridge payments every year, regular as clockwork—except for one gap. Sixteen months with no transaction at all, beginning right after Alex’s father died.

He traced the blank space with his finger. “Zoe, what happened here?”

She leaned in, squinted at the displayed file structure. “There’s a note embedded. One line.” She highlighted it, read aloud: “‘Discontinuation due to witness cooperation.’”

Luca’s testimony. The months when Luca had talked, Viktor had frozen his assets—hidden the money in a place even the syndicate couldn’t reach.

“Where did it go?” Alex asked.

Zoe dug deeper. Her face paled. “A shell company. One that’s still active.” She turned the laptop toward him, and Alex read the name.

The Ana Kessler Trust.

The room tilted. His mother’s name. Funded by Viktor’s laundered millions, structured to keep her alive and compliant in a property registered to the trust’s holding arm.

Alex looked at the address listed beneath it. Viktor’s estate. East wing.

“He’s been paying her maintenance out of his own dirty money,” Alex murmured. “That’s how he keeps her. The trust is both the cage and the leash.”

Jules was watching him. “What does that mean?”

“It means,” Alex said, straightening despite the fire in his shoulder, “if we seize the trust’s assets—if we make that money unclaimable overnight—Viktor loses the financial hold on her. She stops being leverage. And if we expose the trust in the same broadcast where we burn his laundering?” His jaw tightened. “He might just decide she’s more trouble alive than dead.”

Marco understood first. “The clock just got a lot shorter.”

Alex met his eyes. “Then we move faster.”