Chapter 2 - The Inner CircleBy twelve o'clock that afternoon, the master bedroom of the Faust estate had been turned into a covert command post.
The ruined mattress had been carefully wrapped in heavy plastic and moved into a locked vault in the basement. A fresh, identical mattress had been brought up, but no one was sleeping on it.
I sat at a marble table in the private study adjoining the bedroom, surrounded by circuit boards, micro-tools, and a digital multimeter I had requested from Dominic’s private workshop. Dominic sat across from me, wearing a crisp black suit, drinking black coffee—his first cup without the heavy sedatives his personal physician had been prescribing him for months.
Next to us stood Sarah Miller, Dominic’s head of corporate intelligence—a sharp, thirty-something woman with slicked-back dark hair and eyes that scanned every corner of the room like a hawk.
“The devices are military-grade, Mr. Faust,” I said, using a pair of fine tweezers to lift the outer casing of one of the transducers under a magnifying lamp. “The casing is stamped with a serial code, but it’s been scrubbed using an acid etch. However... whoever assembled them made a mistake.”
Dominic leaned in, his gray eyes fixed on the microscopic components. “What mistake?”
“The solder used on the circuit board,” I explained, pointing to a tiny silver joint near the timer chip. “Standard commercial electronics use lead-free solder. It’s dull and grey. This solder has a high silver content—it’s bright, shiny, and used almost exclusively in high-end custom audio modifications or specialized marine electronics.”
Sarah Miller snapped her fingers. “Marine electronics. The harbor expansion project.”
Dominic’s jaw tightened. “Julian hired a private naval contracting firm three months ago to audit the shipping docks in South Chicago. BlueWave Tactical.”
“BlueWave’s lead engineer is a guy named Marcus Vance,” Sarah added, pulling up a file on her tablet. “Julian’s younger brother. A disgraced navy technician who was discharged four years ago for illegal equipment modifications.”
The puzzle pieces were clicking into place with horrifying precision.
It wasn't just a plot to make Dominic feel sick; it was a systematic, corporate execution. By slowly depriving Dominic of deep sleep, Julian and Marcus were driving him into a state that mirrored severe psychiatric breakdown. Under Illinois law, if a CEO is declared mentally incapacitated by a board-certified physician, their voting proxy automatically transfers to the designated trustee—Julian Vance.
And once Julian had full voting proxy, he could approve the multi-billion-dollar sale of Faust Enterprises’ port assets to a foreign syndicate, strip the company’s treasury, and leave Dominic locked away in a private psychiatric facility for the rest of his life.
“The physician,” Dominic said suddenly, his voice cold as steel. “Dr. Sterling.”
“Your personal doctor?” I asked.
“He’s the one who diagnosed me with early-onset dementia,” Dominic said, a dark flame ignited in his eyes. “He’s the one who insisted I stay in this room, on that bed, and prescribed high-dose anti-anxiety meds that made me too groggy during the day to question what was happening to me at night.”
“He wasn't treating you,” I realized, a wave of nausea washing over me. “He was pacifying you so the transducers could finish the job.”
The door to the study opened, and Marco stepped inside. He looked visibly shaken.
“Boss,” Marco reported, lowering his head. “Julian just arrived at the front gate. He’s brought Dr. Sterling with him. They say they’re here for your weekly cognitive evaluation.”
Dominic didn't flinch. He slowly stood up from the chair, buttoning his suit jacket. For the first time in five months, he stood at his full height, the predatory grace of the man who ruled Chicago returning in full force.
“Sarah,” Dominic ordered softly. “Ensure all security cameras in the west wing are running on a fifteen-second loop. I don't want any record of what happens in this room.”
“Understood, boss.”
Dominic turned to me. “Tess, you stay right here. When they come upstairs, I want you sitting in that chair, holding those devices.”
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I blinked, my heart dropping into my stomach. “You want me to confront them?”
“I want them to see the exact moment their world ends,” Dominic said, a dark, terrifying smile playing on his lips. “And I want them to know it was an eighteen-dollar-an-hour housekeeper who exposed them.”
