Chapter 2 - The Shadow of the Friday Ritual
The clock on the library mantel ticked toward eleven.
Dominic buzzed for Grant Bell. A moment later, his security chief stepped into the room, holding the whiteboard tucked under his left arm. Grant’s face was carved from granite—forty-five years old, broken nose from an old street fight in Brooklyn, and eyes that missed nothing.
Dominic picked up a black marker and wrote directly on the board:
Investigate CRD. Quietly.
Grant read the three letters. His expression didn't change, but his eyes sharpened instantly. He didn't ask questions. In Grant’s world, questions were liabilities.
What am I looking for? Grant wrote back.
Dominic handed him the brass button. Grant took it, held it up to the desk lamp, and examined the crossed hammers and the stamped initials with a jeweler's loupe he kept in his pocket.
Found it in the study after Hale left, Dominic wrote. Lily saw him drop it.
Grant’s jaw tightened. Dr. Calvin Hale had been treating Dominic since the explosion. Every Friday at seven in the morning, Hale administered a neurological check, monitored his vitals, and applied a series of specialized liquid drops to his ear canals to prevent scar tissue buildup and infection from the ruptured eardrums.
It was a routine so ingrained, so sanctified by medical authority, that Dominic had never once questioned it.
Hale is an MD, Grant wrote on the board, his handwriting bold and fast. Affiliated with Columbia Presbyterian. Board member of three medical trusts.
Titles don't mean anything in our line of work, Grant, Dominic wrote back. Find out what CRD stands for. Check every medical supply house, chemical manufacturer, and private laboratory in the tri-state area. I want a full dossier on Hale’s private accounts by tomorrow night.
Grant pocketed the button. Consider it done. What about the wedding preparations?
Dominic stared at the whiteboard for a long beat. The wedding proceeds as planned. Let Vanessa and her father think nothing has changed.
Understood.
As Grant turned to leave, Dominic stopped him with a single tap on the desk.
Keep an eye on Rachel and the girl, Dominic wrote. If Hale dropped that button here, he knows someone noticed. I won't have them caught in the crossfire.
Grant gave a single, heavy nod and slipped out of the room like a ghost.
Dominic walked over to his private desk safe, spun the dial, and pulled out a thick, leather-bound file labeled INVESTIGATION: THE MANHATTAN BOMBING – THREE YEARS AGO.
He opened it to the crime scene photographs.
The restaurant had been an upscale Italian bistro in Little Italy, owned by an associate of the Mercer family. Ethan had been sitting across from him when the device—concealed inside a decorative brass floor heater—detonated. Ethan had died instantly from the concussive blast. Dominic had been thrown against a stone pillar, his eardrums instantly vaporized by the pressure wave, plunging him into total, unyielding silence.
The official police report blamed a rival faction led by Salvatore Moretti.
Dominic had hunted Moretti’s crew for six months until every last one of them lay six feet under.
Yet, as he stared at the old photographs of the blast site, a terrifying thought crawled out of the dark.
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What if Moretti hadn't targeted Ethan? What if the bomb was designed to kill both of them—or worse, what if Dominic was meant to survive, but not quite whole?
What if the deafness wasn't an accident of the explosion, but a managed outcome?
