Chapter 5 - The French Syndicate’s Ultimatum
The silence following the severed transmission was deafening.
Vittorio stared at the blank console. “Boss... Salerno is only twenty minutes
away by speedboat. If the Marseille faction has landed, they could have sixty
armed mercenaries on the lower cliffs within the hour.”
“Let them come,” Cassian said without a flicker of doubt. “Activate the naval
mines along the private cove. Tell our snipers on the promontory that anyone
entering the perimeter without a Vance transponder is to be dropped on sight.”
He turned around, his broad frame blocking the light from the tall windows, his
eyes fixed on me.
“Sarah.”
“Yes, Mr. Vance?” I whispered, struggling to keep my voice from trembling.
“You are not stepping foot outside the interior vault today. Vittorio will
escort you and Mia to the reinforced bunker beneath the central courtyard.”
“Mr. Vance, I can help,” I said, stepping forward, desperation overriding my
fear. “I worked with my father on the French accounts for five years before he
died. I know how Fontaine encrypts his communications. I know the frequencies
their tactical units use.”
Cassian studied me for three long seconds. His expression didn't change, but his
eyes assessed me with the sharp scrutiny of a commander measuring an unexpected
asset.
“You can decode Fontaine’s tactical chatter?”
“If you give me access to the base radio receiver and thirty minutes with the
transponder’s encryption key,” I replied firmly. “My father designed the
secondary security architecture for Fontaine’s communication hubs in Marseille.
I know their fail-safe protocols.”
Vittorio looked skeptical. “Boss, we have specialized communications officers in
Naples—”
“Naples is forty miles away across blocked roads,” Cassian interrupted. He
turned to me. “Vittorio, set up an auxiliary monitoring station in my private
study. Bring Sarah the terminal equipment immediately.”
Ten minutes later, I was seated at a secondary console in Cassian’s mahogany
study, headphones clamped over my ears, typing furiously on an encrypted
keyboard.
Mia sat on the thick Persian rug beside my desk, playing quietly with a wooden
puzzle Cassian had carved for her years ago. Her small hands were steady now,
calmed by the familiar click of my fingers against the keys and the scent of the
cedarwood burning in the hearth.
Through the static of the tactical receiver, the first garbled French
transmissions began to leak through the encrypted noise:
“...Squad Alpha approaching sector three... sea wall is hot... snipers spotted
on the upper terrace...”
I grabbed a notepad, scribbling down the coordinates in rapid, precise
handwriting.
“They’re not using the front gates, Mr. Vance,” I called out to Cassian, who
stood by the study doors reviewing operational maps with Vittorio. “They’re
landing inflatable Zodiacs on the rocky beach beneath the old smugglers' cave.
They intend to climb the drainage pipes straight into the lower wine vaults.”
Cassian’s head snapped toward me. “The wine vaults.”
“That’s where Giselle is being held,” I explained, pointing to the architectural
schematics glowing on my screen. “Fontaine isn't trying to storm the front
gates. He’s sending an extraction team to liberate Giselle first so he can call
in an airstrike without risking his daughter’s life.”
Cassian’s jaw hardened into a terrifying, triumphant line.
“They think they’re extracting a hostage,” Cassian murmured, his eyes glittering
with cold malice. “Vittorio. Move Giselle from the wine cellar to the upper
watchtower immediately. Rig the wine cellar with remote detonators and
fragmentation charges.”
“Right away, boss.” Vittorio hurried out of the room.
Cassian walked over to my desk, leaning over my shoulder to examine the
intercepted coordinates.
His proximity was overwhelming—the subtle scent of bergamot, leather, and
gunpowder wrapping around my senses like an electric current.
“You just saved twenty of my men from an ambush, Sarah,” Cassian said quietly,
his voice low enough that only I could hear.
I looked up, our faces barely inches apart. His obsidian eyes were dark,
intense, and filled with a raw, undeniable respect that made my heart hammer in
my chest.
“I told you I could help, Mr. Vance,” I whispered.
Cassian reached out, his thumb lightly brushing against the side of my jawline,
May you like
a gesture so fleeting, so unexpectedly tender, that my breath hitched.
“Stay with Mia,” he said softly. “When I come back, this war will be finished.”
