Chapter 5 - THE LAWYER WHO KNEW TOO MUCH
Viktor answered Tomas's call without telling him where we were.
“The vote?”
“Delayed,” Tomas said. “Pierce agreed to twenty minutes.”
“Why?”
“Because I told him we were verifying the authorization.”
I stared at Viktor.
Grandma's letter remained open between us.
Do not trust the man who calls himself their lawyer.
Viktor asked, “Who has seen Pierce's document?”
“Everyone.”
“And the seal?”
A pause.
“It carries the council mark.”
Viktor looked down at the silver medallion in my hand.
“No,” he said. “It doesn't.”
Silence.
Then Tomas laughed quietly.
“What are you talking about?”
“The original seal is somewhere else.”
Another pause.
Longer this time.
“How would you know that?”
Viktor's eyes met mine.
That was the question.
Not where.
Not who had it.
How would you know?
Tomas had revealed too much.
Viktor ended the call.
“We leave. Now.”
One of the security men stepped into the hallway first.
Then every light in the storage facility went out.
Darkness swallowed the corridor.
My heart jumped.
Viktor grabbed my hand.
“Stay beside me.”
A metal door slammed somewhere downstairs.
Footsteps followed.
Fast.
Two men were moving toward our unit.
Viktor's security team pushed us through an emergency stairwell.
We reached the parking level as a car engine roared behind us.
For several terrifying seconds, everything became headlights, concrete pillars, shouting, and running feet.
Then we were inside the SUV.
The driver accelerated.
I twisted around.
A dark sedan followed.
Viktor calmly called another vehicle toward us, then looked at the leather notebook I had grabbed from the box.
“Open it.”
My hands were still trembling.
The first pages contained names and dates from the 1990s.
Payments.
Shipping routes.
Council meetings.
Then I reached the final page.
There was a photograph glued inside.
My grandmother stood beside a much younger Andor Kovacs.
Between them was a little boy around eight years old.
I recognized Viktor immediately.
But there was another child in the photograph.
A teenager standing behind him.
Tomas Varga.
Beneath the picture, Ilona had written:
May you like
ONE OF THESE BOYS WILL INHERIT ANDOR'S EMPIRE.
THE OTHER WILL SPEND HIS LIFE BELIEVING IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN HIS.
