Chapter 18 - The Midnight Heist
Three months passed.
Summer had rolled over New York, bathing the city in golden sunlight and warm Atlantic breezes. The trial of Vanessa Sterling and Julian Cross had captivated the nation, but Elena and Lily had been spared the media circus. My legal team had handled everything behind closed doors, dismantling the remnants of the Cross cartel piece by piece.
Terminal 4 was now operating at maximum capacity, its deep-water docks handling ships from across the globe, staffed by workers whose union contracts were the fairest in the country.
Elena had traded her cleaning cart for an office overlooking the bay. She was now the director of the Vance Community Foundation, funding shelters, education programs, and legal aid for domestic abuse survivors.
Lily had turned four. She now had her own pony at the Hudson Valley estate and spoke endlessly about the "green water" ships that docked at her uncle Ethan’s port.
Except, she didn't call me "Mr. Ethan" anymore.
For the past three weeks, she had started calling me "Daddy." And every time that word left her lips, it rewired something deep inside my soul.
It was midnight on a Friday when I stood on the balcony of our seaside home in Montauk. Elena had fallen asleep inside, exhausted from organizing the summer charity benefit.
I stood by the railing, staring at the moonlight shimmering across the ocean swells. In my pocket was a small, velvet box containing a three-carat cushion-cut diamond—a ring that had nothing to do with society mergers, family pressure, or corporate alliances.
A ring that meant everything.
Suddenly, my phone buzzed on the deck table.
It was Marcus.
"Ethan," Marcus said, his voice unusually sharp. "We have a situation."
I stiffened, my hand dropping to my pocket. "What happened? Julian is in ADX Florence. Vanessa is in Bedford Hills."
"It's not Julian," Marcus said. "Our maritime patrol just picked up an unidentified luxury yacht entering New York territorial waters without transponder clearance. It bypassed federal customs using a diplomatic escort corridor from South America."
"Whose yacht is it?"
"The vessel is registered to the Reyes-Montenegro estate," Marcus answered, hesitating. "Ethan... do you know who Elena’s mother was?"
My breath hitched. "Elena told me her mother died when she was six in Colombia."
"Her mother didn't die," Marcus said quietly. "Her mother was Victoria Montenegro—the matriarch of the largest private coffee and shipping conglomerate in South America. Elena wasn't an ordinary maid who fell into bad luck, Ethan. She was an exiled heiress who ran away from an arranged dynasty marriage ten years ago."
I gripped the wooden railing, the cold ocean wind hitting my face.
"And why is the yacht here now?" I demanded.
May you like
"Because Victoria Montenegro just docked at Terminal 4," Marcus replied. "She has twenty private security guards, a team of international lawyers, and she’s demanding to see her granddaughter before sunrise."
***
