Chapter 6 - The Empty Nest and the Frozen Window
The private jet’s tires screeched against the icy tarmac of the Gary-Chicago International Airport just as a fierce, howling snow squall began to blanket the Midwest. The wind buffeted the fuselage, shaking the cabin with a violent shudder.
I unbuckled my seatbelt with sharp, jerky movements, my phone clutched in my palm. The screen was dark. No missed calls. No alerts.
Just as I stood up to grab my heavy wool coat from the overhead bin, my phone buzzed violently in my hand.
It wasn't Pietro. It was an international-style encrypted VoIP notification—a direct ping routed through our estate’s internal security server.
I tapped the screen. It was a security camera still-frame from the east wing corridor of my Buffalo home.
The timestamp read 05:14 AM.
Marta stood in the center of Julia’s bedroom doorway, her hands flying to her mouth in a gesture of pure, unadulterated horror. The French windows overlooking the frozen garden were swung wide open, banging rhythmically against the exterior brick wall in the freezing gale.
The velvet armchair was empty. The oxygen concentrator hummed quietly against the wall, its plastic line disconnected and trailing across the hardwood like a dead snake.
My heart slammed against my ribs with the force of a sledgehammer. The blood roared in my ears, drowning out the whine of the jet’s engines powering down around me.
"Pietro," I choked out, my voice cracking as I spun around to face him. Pietro was already halfway down the aisle, his phone pressed to his ear, his face draining of all color.
"Boss," Pietro said, his voice dropping into a breathless rasp. "That was Marta. She went in to check the oxygen levels... the room was empty. Julia's gone."
"Gone?" I roared, lunging across the aisle and grabbing Pietro by the collar of his suit jacket. "What do you mean she's gone? She couldn't walk ten feet without collapsing! Her lung capacity is at twenty-eight percent! She needs continuous oxygen!"
"She climbed out the window, Adriano," Pietro said, his eyes wide, mirroring the panic clawing at my own chest. "Marta found a pair of snow boots and a heavy coat missing from the mudroom closet. She didn't run away. She came after us."
The cabin tilted on its axis.
Everything clicked into place with terrifying, mathematical precision. Moretti hadn't given up Heinrich easily because Heinrich wasn't just a chemist in Gary, Indiana.
Heinrich was the man who had formulated the custom toxin for the hit on my car—and Julia knew that if Moretti and I squared off in a blind war, the fallout would consume everything. She hadn't stayed behind to die quietly in her bed. She had realized where we were going, and she had slipped out into the freezing night to stop a bloodbath that would destroy us both.
"Cancel the car to Heinrich's warehouse," I commanded, my voice dropping into a cold, lethal register that made even Pietro step back. "Call the private hangar. We’re turning the bird around right now."
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"Adriano, if she’s out in this weather without her tank, she won't last twenty minutes," Pietro warned, his hand hovering over his radio. "We have to find her before her lungs fill with fluid."
"Then we tear the city apart until we find her," I snarled, sprinting down the airplane steps into the teeth of the blinding blizzard.
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