Chapter 5
The vibration of my phone on the marble countertop felt like a premonition. It was Damian’s phone—he’d left it behind in his haste to answer the landline in the study. I glanced at the screen. *Carla.*
I picked it up, my thumb hovering over the message notification. It wasn't a text; it was a video file. I pressed play.
The footage was grainy, the lighting theatrical. Carla sat tied to a chair in what looked like a derelict warehouse, mascara running in perfect rivulets down her cheeks. "Damian," she sobbed, her voice pitching up in a performance that would have been laughable if the stakes weren't so high. "Please, they have guns. They want money. Don't call the police. Just come."
The study door flew open. Damian emerged, his face gray, clutching his other phone—his encrypted business line. He looked at me, then at the device in my hand. Panic made him sloppy; he didn't even ask why I was holding it.
"I have to go," he said, grabbing his keys. "Business emergency. A server breach at the data center."
"At ten o'clock at night?" I asked, keeping my voice steady, though my pulse hammered against my ribs.
"It's critical, Ana. Don't wait up." He brushed past me, smelling of fear and sweat. He didn't kiss me goodbye.
As the elevator doors slid shut, I unlocked my own phone. The tracking app I’d installed on his device during his shower the previous night blinked a steady red dot. He wasn't heading to the data center in Jersey. He was speeding toward the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
I didn't hesitate. I dialed Papa.
"Ana?" His voice was groggy, thick with sleep.
"Papa, I need you. Damian is in trouble. I think... I think he's walking into a trap." I grabbed my coat, my movements precise and cold. "Meet me at the corner of Flushing and Navy. Please. I can't do this alone."
***
The warehouse district was a graveyard of industry, all rusted corrugated metal and shattered windows. Rain slicked the pavement, turning the streetlights into blurred streaks of orange neon. I parked the Audi in the shadows, watching Damian’s Porsche sit abandoned near a loading dock.
Papa’s town car pulled up moments later. He stepped out, looking frail in the harsh light, clutching his chest as the wind whipped his coat. Guilt spiked in my gut—I shouldn't have brought him here—but I needed a witness. I needed someone else to see the monster Damian had become.
"Stay behind me," I whispered, gripping his arm. The warehouse door was ajar.
We moved into the gloom. The air smelled of wet concrete and ozone. Voices echoed from the center of the cavernous space—shouting, frantic and jagged.
"...said no police!" A rough voice boomed.
"I didn't call anyone!" Damian’s voice cracked. "Just let her go!"
We rounded a stack of shipping pallets, and the scene unfolded like a tableau from hell. Damian stood in the center of the floor, hands raised. Carla was bound to a chair, sobbing. But something was wrong. The men surrounding them weren't actors. They moved with the twitchy, violent energy of predators who realized they’d stumbled onto a bigger kill.
"Well, look at this," the leader sneered. He was a giant of a man, a scar dissecting his eyebrow. He raised a heavy pistol, pointing it straight at us. "The party's growing."
"Ana!" Damian spun around, horror washing over his face. Not concern. Horror that his two worlds were colliding.
Two thugs grabbed us before I could scream. Rough hands twisted my arms behind my back, forcing me to my knees beside Damian. They shoved Papa down next to me. He gasped, his face turning an alarming shade of ashen gray.
"Let him go," I hissed, struggling against the grip. "He's an old man."
"Shut up," the leader barked. He turned to Damian, grinning. "So, rich boy. Your little girlfriend here," he gestured to Carla with the gun barrel, "hired us for a little scare tactic. Easy money, she said. Fake kidnapping. But looking at the watch on your wrist... I’m thinking the price just went up."
Carla’s sobbing stopped abruptly. She stared at the floor, her face burning with humiliation and terror.
Damian looked at her, then at me. The betrayal in his eyes was eclipsed by sheer, paralyzing cowardice.
"I want five million," the leader said. "Bitcoin. Transfer it now. Or I start painting the walls."
"I... I can't move that much instantly," Damian stammered, sweat dripping from his nose. "The banks... the limits..."
"Then you have a problem." The gunman cocked his head. "I can let two of you walk out right now to go arrange the transfer. But one stays here. Collateral. Until the coin clears tomorrow."
The silence that followed was deafening. It stretched, taut and screaming, filling the warehouse.
"Two go free," the gunman repeated. "You choose, rich boy. Who walks out with you? The wife?" He pointed the gun at me. "Or the mistress?"
Damian’s gaze darted frantically. He looked at me—his wife of seven years, the woman whose bedside he claimed to have wept over. Then he looked at Carla—the woman who stroked his ego, who carried his lies.
Then, he looked at Papa.
Papa was clutching his left arm, his breathing shallow and ragged. "Damian," Papa wheezed, his voice barely a whisper. "Help... Ana."
Damian squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them, they were wet, pleading, and pathetic.
"I... I can't leave Carla," he whispered. "She's... she's pregnant."
The lie hung in the air, toxic and heavy.
"Take Carla," Damian said, his voice stronger now, desperate to justify the unforgivable. He pointed a shaking finger at my father. "Keep the old man. He... he's slow. He won't give you trouble. I'll take Ana and Carla and get the money."
"No!" I screamed, lunging forward, but the thug slammed my face into the concrete. I tasted copper.
"Deal," the leader laughed. "The old man stays."
"No, take me!" I shrieked, watching Papa slump sideways, his eyes rolling back. "Damian, look at him! He's dying!"
Damian didn't look. He grabbed Carla’s arm as the thugs cut her ropes. He hauled her up, refusing to meet my gaze, refusing to see the man who had treated him like a son gasping for his last breaths on the dirty floor.
"I'll be back," Damian choked out, dragging Carla toward the exit. "I promise, Ana. I'll be back."
The heavy metal door slammed shut, sealing us in the dark. The sound echoed like a gunshot, marking the end of my marriage, and the beginning of my war.
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