My uncle told me I was being shipped off to New Jersey to serve a mandatory alliance contract with a veteran syndicate partner named Gabe DeLuca.
The silence after I hung up on Vic was short-lived. My phone rang again almost immediately, this time with an unknown number. I answered.
“Leo Ross?” a crisp, authoritative voice stated. “This is Mr. Rossi, chief auditor for Don Salvatore Moretti. We have just received an emergency amended filing concerning the Ross Dockland Estate and Mr. Victor Ross’s collateral. Along with some… highly irregular activity on a Manhattan clearing account.”
“Yes, Mr. Rossi,” I confirmed. “How can I help you?”
“We are issuing a mandatory syndicate margin call on Mr. Victor Ross,” Rossi continued, his voice devoid of emotion. “He has exactly three hours to produce eight million dollars in verified, unencumbered cash balance.”
A triumphant surge went through me. Three hours. The trap was fully sprung.
“Failure to comply,” Rossi added, “will result in the immediate liquidation of all his syndicate holdings and personal assets under Commission rules.”
He gave me the address of Vic’s office building in Manhattan, and the exact time the three-hour deadline would expire. Then he hung up.
“Margin call,” I announced to Julian. “Three hours. Eight million dollars in cash.”
Julian whistled, low and long. “Don Moretti doesn’t play around with his money. Not with eight million.”
We knew Vic would be scrambling. He’d be trying to move money, call favors, beg, borrow, or steal from any available source. But the beauty of the trap was that his primary offshore laundering account, Apex Maritime, was now depleted by my earlier $450,000 transfer, leaving him with an unexplained $150,000 deficit. And now, the larger sum, the $8 million he thought was safe in the Manhattan clearing bank, was vulnerable.
“He’s going to hit every single contact he has,” Julian predicted, pacing the small office. “Every capo, every lieutenant. No one will give him that kind of money on such short notice.”
“No one will touch it,” I agreed. “Not with a Commission audit looming. Any money transferred to Vic now would immediately be flagged as complicit in his fraud.”
The phone rang again. It was Maya. Her voice was frantic.
“Leo, you wouldn’t believe it,” she gasped. “Don Moretti’s personal auditors just arrived at Dad’s building. Cars everywhere. Black suits. They went straight to his office.”
“I know,” I said. “I just got off the phone with Mr. Rossi.”
“Dad’s completely losing it,” Maya continued. “He’s yelling at everyone. Trying to get offshore wires approved. But nothing’s going through.”
“It won’t,” I told her, remembering the earlier steps of my plan. “He doesn’t have time.”
The three-hour clock was ticking. It was a deadline Vic couldn’t charm his way out of, bribe his way through, or intimidate his way around. Don Moretti’s rules were absolute, and his patience for financial deficit was zero.
I looked at the ancient ledger still on Devlin’s desk. The weight of its secrets had just turned into the hammer of justice.
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