Chapter 28
TWENTY-EIGHT
LYKOS
Sleep refused to find me, so I found myself back in the room that saw me the most over the past decades.
My office.
The doors stood open to the terrace, letting the cool April night air drift inside in slow, salt-laced currents. Midnight in Greece carried a different kind of silence than most places. It wasn’t as noisy as the American cities, but it was alive in a more subtle and calm way.
From somewhere far below the cliffs came the steady hush and pull of the sea, waves folding against the rocks in rhythmic breaths that rose through the darkness like a living thing inhaling. The sea sounded gentle, but also ancient at night.
I could relate to it.
Wind moved through the olive and lemon groves beyond the estate, stirring leaves into a dry whispering shimmer that carried across the dark hillsides. Every so often, the branches clicked softly together, skeletal and hollow in the dark.
Cicadas pulsed in uneven waves from the stone terraces and cypress trees, their chorus rising and falling hypnotically in the cool spring air that wasn’t quite as deafening as summer, but enough to fill the spaces between thoughts.
Somewhere farther into the city, a dog barked once. Another answered. A lone owl called from somewhere near the grove. Then silence reclaimed the darkness.
The scent of damp earth mingling with sea salt drifted in after the night. Occasionally the wind shifted hard enough to carry the smell of the sea and lavender.
I sat behind the desk with my sleeves shoved to my forearms and a half-finished glass of whiskey sitting beside the keyboard.
Another wave crashed below the cliffs and I leaned back slowly in the chair, rubbing tired fingers over my mouth. Greece at night always sounded old, almost as if the land remembered every civilization that had marched across it or lived on it.
Tonight, the Obsidian Society and Dick Freud’s files glowed on my screen, casting cold blue light across the office.
Nature breathed steadily outside while screens in front of me displayed trafficking routes, shell companies, and photographs of men responsible for actions most people would never survive hearing about.
But all my attention was on Dick Freud’s life unraveling across six different monitors.
The man and this secretive society were built like a fortress with layer upon layer of deceit and legitimacy wrapped around rot.
My phone rang and I flicked a glance at the caller ID.
It was Salvatore.
I answered, pressing the phone against my ear. “Where did all this information come from?”
Salvatore was many things, but he wasn’t a hacker and there was no way that he’d dug up all this information.
“Curtesy of Kingston Ashford. Your buddy Mateo Agosti reached out to him and asked him to dig up dirt on the Obsidian Society,” he replied.
Kingston Ashford was a reluctant friend, but he was definitely very competent and resourceful.
It was a good thing we were on the same side.
“You have friends in high places, buddy.”
I let out a dry laugh. “If you say so.”
Salvatore went straight to business and asked, “Did you read the reports?”
“I did.”
“And?” he urged.
I dragged another encrypted file onto the main screen. “And I can’t believe they’ve been flying under the radar.”
I opened another report, eyes scanning lines of information filled with horror that would make any decent criminal sick to their stomach.
Stock market manipulations. Insider trading.
Human trafficking. Hunting games with humans as prey.
“They’ve been having these human hunting games using Marabella arrangements and auctions all over the world,” he said, gritting his teeth. “On my territory. On yours. How in the fuck did we not hear about it?”
“We know about it now,” I hissed. “And we have one name associated with this society. We’ll start with him and go from there.”
A pause crackled through the line.
“This organization seems squeaky clean,” Salvatore pointed out. “The evidence we’re looking at is circumstantial at best. Taking it down will be hard.”
“It will,” I agreed. “But we’ll start small. There’s mention of cargo at ports. It would seem our shipment wasn’t the only one they intercepted, however no port ever records receipts for this society.”
Salvatore knew enough about ports to understand exactly what that meant.
“Hidden cargo?”
“Yes. Those containers disappear before inspection.” I clicked through manifests. “Mid-route rerouting. Private docks. Corrupted customs agents. By the time authorities start looking, the records are already altered.”
“Did you find what they usually go after?”
I exhaled slowly through my nose. “Weapons.”
The next file opened after decrypting and photos filled the screen. Crates of military-grade rifles. Explosives packed beneath humanitarian aid labels.
My jaw tightened.
“Jesus Christ,” Salvatore muttered.
Another encrypted message appeared on my monitor and I clicked it open. A compressed archive downloaded itself automatically and soon images loaded. Black-and-white photographs.
Old Boston mansions. Private galas. Charity foundations.
Men in tuxedos standing beneath crystal chandeliers with the casual arrogance of people who had never once been told no in their lives.
Then came the symbol.
“What the fuck?”
“What now?” Salvatore asked.
The symbol was the black obsidian circle etched with a silver serpent consuming its own tail. The very same one that Violet wore around her neck. And it was the same symbol used as a seal on every shipment.
My eyes locked on the name beneath the symbol on one of the shipments.
THE OBSIDIAN SOCIETY.
Cold settled beneath my ribs as I leaned forward slightly.
“What is it?” Salvatore asked again.
I scanned the attached intelligence brief.
“This society is old money.” My voice came out low. “For fuck’s sake, they’re politicians, congressmen, cardinals, princes…”
Boston Brahmins. Political dynasties. Banking families. Judges. Industrial heirs. Generations of wealth so entrenched it functioned above the law entirely.
“Michael… The guy that stole our shipment did say the rich and powerful own the Obsidian Society. It seems he wasn’t lying,” Salvatore grumbled. “I kind of wish he was.”
The Obsidian Society had allegedly existed for two centuries, originating among elite Boston families during the Gilded Age. Publicly, they were philanthropists, patrons of the arts, donors to universities and hospitals.
Privately?
Power brokers. Fixers. Predators.
They didn’t dirty their own hands. They funded people who did.
Entire criminal networks operated like extensions of their will while they attended galas and sat on charity boards pretending civilization existed because of them.
“This is more than organized crime,” Salvatore said grimly.
“It’s organized power,” I declared, staring at the serpent symbol glowing against the screen. “And as long as Dick Freud is alive, this Obsidian Society will be a threat to my family.”