Revenge Is Mine

13: Dead End

Marco Mancini

My eyes burned. I stared at the bright computer screen until the numbers just blurred together into a big mess.

It was past midnight. The company building was completely empty, but I was still sitting at my desk, sweating through my shirt. I was trying to fake the financial documents Viviana asked for. I was moving numbers around, trying to create fake invoices and fake consulting fees but it was impossible. You cannot just fake millions of euros going into a black hole. Viviana's auditors were too smart, and the missing money was just too huge to hide.

I rubbed my face hard with both hands, I felt like the walls of my office were slowly closing in on me. Suddenly, the door of my office pushed open.

Alesia walked in, she was holding a thin brown folder in her hand. "Well?" I asked, sitting up straight. My voice sounded desperate, even to my own ears. "Tell me you have something I can use."

Alesia walked slowly to one of the chairs across from my desk and dropped her bag on the floor. She threw the brown folder onto my desk, and it was completely empty. "Nothing," she said, her voice flat and defeated.

"What do you mean, nothing?" I snapped, picking up the empty folder and throwing it back down. "You hired the most expensive private investigator in the city! You told me you were going to ruin her! You promised me we would find a secret to trap her!"

"I tried!" Alesia yelled back, clearly just as stressed as I was. "The investigator called me twenty minutes ago. He quit, Marco."

"He quit?" I stood up from my chair. "I paid him ten thousand euros just to start digging! Call him back and tell him to do his job!"

"He won't answer my calls anymore," Alesia said, shaking her head. "He said he hit a massive brick wall. He tried to look into Viviana Marino's past... old bank records, secret lovers, messy divorces, hidden debts. He found absolutely nothing. Her background is completely spotless."

"Nobody is spotless!" I slammed my hand on the desk, making the pens jump. "Every single rich person has a secret, Alesia! Everyone has dirt! Tell him to dig deeper into her old company!"

"He refuses to take the job!" Alesia threw her hands up in the air. "He said whoever is protecting Viviana's files is way too powerful. He tried to hack into a simple server to check her old addresses, and he got immediately locked out. He said he got a warning message on his screen that scared him half to death. He wired my money back to my account and told me to never contact him again. There is nothing we can use against her."

I felt all the air leave my lungs. My legs went weak, and I fell back into my chair. The very last bit of hope I had just vanished into thin air. I had no leverage at all, I couldn't charm her with my looks, and I couldn't blackmail her with her secrets. She was completely untouchable, and I was completely ruined.

"We can find another way," Alesia said, taking a step toward the desk."We can hire someone else who isn't afraid to break the rules."

"Get out," I whispered. I couldn't even look at her.

"Marco, listen to me, we just need more time..."

"Get out!" I roared, pointing a shaking finger at the door. "You are completely useless! You ruined this deal with your stupid jealousy, and your big plan to fix it was a total failure! Leave me alone! Get out of my sight before I lose my mind!"

Alesia glared at me. Her face turned bright red, and her eyes filled with angry tears. She opened her mouth to scream back at me, but she stopped. She picked up her bag, turned around, and stormed out of the office. She slammed the door so hard the glass windows rattled.

The room went dead silent.

I was totally alone, I buried my face in my hands and pulled at my hair. My heart was beating so fast it actually hurt my chest.

I suddenly froze.

The sound of ice dropping into a glass cut through the quiet room.

I slowly lifted my head, the main lights in my office were turned off. The only light came from the small lamp on my desk, casting a warm glow over my papers but leaving the corners of the room in deep shadows.

Over by my personal liquor cabinet, standing completely in the dark, was a man.

I didn't hear the door open, didn't hear footsteps on the floor, didn't even hear him breathing but he was standing right there, holding one of my glasses and pouring my best whiskey into it.

"Who are you?" I asked. My voice was shaking so badly I sounded like a terrified child. "How did you get in here? Security is supposed to lock the building at night."

The man didn't answer right away, he calmly put the stopper back on the whiskey bottle. He took a slow sip of his drink. Then, he stepped out of the shadows.

He was tall and broad, wearing a perfectly tailored black suit, his face was sharp, with dark hair and cold, empty eyes. He looked completely bored and that made him the scariest man I had ever seen in my entire life.

"You have very good taste in drinks, Marco," the man said. His voice was smooth, quiet, and polite. He walked closer, his shoes making absolutely no sound on the floor. "But you have very bad taste in business partners."

"Who are you?" I asked again. I pushed my chair back a little, putting more distance between us. I looked quickly at the door, but it was way too far away. If I ran, he would catch me before I even turned the handle.

"My boss sent me to check on you," the man said. He stopped right in front of my desk and looked down at me. "I believe you manage some special accounts for him... Blackwood Holdings, for example."

A cold sweat broke out all over my body. My stomach flipped upside down, and I felt like I was going to throw up. "Yes," I stammered. I held my hands up, trying to look harmless. "Yes, of course. Please, tell Mr. Morano that I am completely dedicated to his business. There is just a small delay with the transfer this month, that is all."

"A delay," the man repeated slowly. He took another sip of his drink, his dead eyes never leaving my face. "Mr. Morano does not like delays. He gave you a very simple job, Marco. We give you cash, you run it through your pretty little company, and you send it back to us completely clean. It is a very easy system, we have been doing it for a long time but this month, the money has not arrived."

"It is the banks!" I lied quickly. My mouth was so dry that my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. "Massive international tax audits are happening right now! I had to pause the transfer to keep the accounts safe! I am protecting Mr. Morano's money! I just need a few more days to clear the red tape. I promise the money is coming!"

The enforcer tilted his head, he looked at me like I was a pathetic bug crawling on the floor. He didn't believe a single word I just said, he knew I was lying. The man reached into the inside pocket of his suit jacket.

I stopped breathing, and I tightly gripped the arms of my chair. I thought he was going to pull out a gun with a silencer and shoot me right in the head. I braced myself for the pain.

Instead, he pulled out his hand and placed something small and heavy right in the middle of my desk.

It was a single, shiny gold bullet.

It sat there on the wood, shining brightly under the desk lamp. The enforcer leaned over the desk, his face was only a few inches from mine.

"Leonardo Morano does not care about bank delays," the man whispered gently, as if he were talking to a friend. "He does not care about tax audits, and he does not care about red tape. He only cares about his money."

I nodded fast, my neck stiff with fear. I was too terrified to speak.

"You have until Friday," the enforcer said. His polite tone was completely gone, "By Friday night, the money needs to be fully transferred into the Blackwood Holdings account, every single penny not a euro less."

"I will do it," I choked out. "Friday, I promise. You will have it."

"Good." The enforcer smiled, but it didn't reach his empty eyes. He reached out and patted my cheek gently. The touch was so light, but it made my skin crawl with pure horror. "Because if the money is not there on Friday, Marco, we will not just put a bullet in your head. That is way too fast."

He leaned in even closer, dropping his voice to a terrifying whisper. "We will take our time," he promised. "We will start with that pretty girlfriend of yours who just left crying, we will make you watch then we will move on to you. We will break every bone in your hands. We will skin you alive and we will make the pain last a very, very long time."

Tears actually stung my eyes. I couldn't blink, I was completely paralyzed in my chair.

The enforcer stood up straight. He picked up the whiskey glass, finished the rest of the drink in one swallow, and set the empty glass down neatly on my desk, right next to the gold bullet.

"Have a good night, Marco," he said politely. He turned around and walked out of the office. He opened the door, stepped out, and the door clicked shut behind him, leaving me completely alone again.

I stared at the gold bullet on my desk, my chest heaved as I finally gasped for air. My whole body started shaking so violently that my teeth actually chattered. I grabbed the edge of the desk to stop myself from falling out of the chair.

I looked at the calendar on my computer screen, and today was Tuesday.

I had exactly three days to come up with millions of euros.

I reached out with shaking fingers and picked up the cold bullet. I squeezed it tightly in my hand.

There was only one option left to stay alive, I had to crawl back to Viviana Marino. I had to beg on my hands and knees, humiliate myself, and give her whatever she wanted so she would unlock that fifty-million-euro investment. She was the only person in the world who could save my life.