Chapter 5 - The Loyal Ghost
The encrypted phone line went completely, horrifyingly dead.
A cold, murderous rage instantly replaced the lingering fear pumping furiously through my veins.
I ordered my surviving security men to secure the mansion and quickly grabbed my heavy tactical gear from the hidden wall safe.
My elite tech team aggressively traced Eleanor's brief phone call to a cheap, rundown motel on the desolate outskirts of Queens.
I drove my armored SUV blindly through the raging blizzard at a reckless, terrifying, suicidal speed.
I arrived at the flickering neon sign of the motel and kicked down the flimsy wooden door of room number four.
The small, dingy room was completely empty of my pregnant wife.
However, three of Victor Rossi's elite, highly trained assassins were lying dead in a pool of blood on the cheap carpet.
Someone had systematically eliminated the deadly mercenaries with cold, calculated, military precision.
I scanned the chaotic room and noticed a distinct, silver hairpin resting carefully on the center of the bedside table.
It was the exact same ornate hairpin my quiet, unassuming housekeeper, Rosa, wore in her hair every single day.
I suddenly remembered Eleanor telling Rosa to water the gardenias before she walked out into the snow.
It was absolutely not a mundane gardening instruction meant for a simple maid.
It was a highly specific, predetermined coded distress signal.
Rosa Alvarez was not just a loyal housekeeper who dusted my expensive furniture.
She was a retired, incredibly lethal covert operative who used to work exclusively for Eleanor's late father.
My phone rang loudly again, displaying an untraceable, completely blocked caller ID.
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"If you ever want to see your wife alive again, come to the old shipyard immediately," Rosa's voice commanded with cold, terrifying authority.
"Come entirely alone, or I will put a hollow-point bullet in your head myself."
