Chapter 2 - The Eighth VoiceThe silence that followed her statement was absolute.
It was the kind of silence that precedes an explosion—a heavy, suffocating pressure where even the air seemed too thick to breathe.
Gregory Volk didn't understand the English words completely, but he recognized the sudden change in the atmosphere. His hand slid slowly toward the inside of his charcoal jacket.
"What did she just say?" Silvio whispered, his voice trembling with a mixture of shock and lethal intent. "She’s insane. She’s a half-wit cleaner suffering from fumes! Shoot her!"
"Touch her," Dominic said softly, "and I'll skin you alive, Uncle."
Dominic didn't take his eyes off Maeve. He slowly dropped to one knee, stepping directly into the pool of soapy water, his expensive suit trousers soaking up the filth without him caring in the slightest. He was eye-level with her now.
"What is your name?" he asked quietly.
"Maeve," she replied, holding his gaze. "Maeve Nolan."
"Maeve," Dominic repeated, testing the weight of it. "You speak Russian?"
"I speak Russian," she said. "The dock worker dialect from Durrës. The prison slang from the North. The Sicilian mountain dialect from the villages around Enna. And four others."
Charles Mercer let out a high-pitched, strangled squeak and backed up against the wall, his knees giving out until he slid down onto the carpet.
Dominic turned his head slowly toward Gregory Volk. "Translate what Mr. Volk said to me three minutes ago, Maeve. Word for word."
Maeve didn't flinch. She looked directly at Gregory.
"He said your brother Anthony has four hours," Maeve recited flatly. "He said if the Newark piers aren't transferred to his nephew by five in the morning, Anthony won't just die. He’ll send him back to you in four separate crates, piece by piece. He called your dockworkers toothless dogs who let the cargo rot while they entertained themselves."
Dominic’s jaw tightened, a tiny muscle twitching beneath his cheekbone.
"And what did Charles translate?" Dominic asked.
"Charles told you Mr. Volk was complaining about structural complications at the dock and asking for an administrative adjustment," Maeve said.
Dominic turned his eyes toward Charles Mercer. The interpreter was sobbing silently, pressing his back against the mahogany wainscoting.
"And my uncle?" Dominic whispered, his voice dropping into a deadly whisper. "What did my dear Uncle Silvio say to me in the dialect of Enna?"
Silvio’s face turned the color of ash. "Dominic! Don't listen to this garbage! She’s a plant! She’s working for the FBI! She’s working for the Irish!"
"Translate, Maeve," Dominic commanded.
"Your uncle told you to listen to Mercer," Maeve said, her tone steady and mechanical, like a court reporter reading back a trial transcript. "He told you to sign the Newark piers away. He said your brother Anthony was soft, that he likely got lost in his own liquor, and that if you fought Volk, the street bosses would think you cared more about your pride than the docks. He said, 'Sign the papers. Let the boy rot. It solves our problem.'"
Silvio pulled a snub-nosed revolver from his shoulder holster.
He never got the chance to raise it.
Dominic’s hand moved with the speed of a striking viper. He grabbed Silvio’s wrist, twisted it back with a horrific SNAP, and wrenched the gun from his hand before Silvio could even scream. Dominic didn't shoot him. He simply slammed the heavy steel butt of the revolver directly into Silvio’s jaw, sending the older man crashing over the mahogany table, scattering documents and crystal glasses across the floor.
Gregory Volk realized the trap had collapsed. He lunged backward, shouting an order in high-speed Russian to his two bodyguards standing near the double doors.
Before the bodyguards could draw their weapons, Dominic’s men fired.
The sharp, deafening pops of silenced handguns filled the boardroom. Gregory’s two bodyguards dropped instantly, their heavy bodies thudding onto the Persian rug. Gregory himself was slammed against the wall by two of Dominic’s senior enforcers, a gun pressed firmly under his chin.
The smell of gunpowder and blood replaced the scent of pine cleaner and stale coffee.
Maeve remained on her knees, her hands flat in the dirty water, her breathing controlled. She had seen violence before. In the shelters, in the docks, in the dark corners of the city where poor people were tossed aside. Violence was just another language spoken by men who had run out of words.
Dominic stood up, buttoning his charcoal suit jacket. He looked down at his uncle, who was groaning on the floor, holding his shattered jaw, blood pooling beneath his silver hair.
Then, Dominic turned to Maeve.
He extended his right hand down to her—the hand of the most feared crime boss in the tri-state area, clean, unblemished, and offered to a woman holding a scrub brush.
"Get up, Maeve," he said gently.
Maeve looked at his hand, then placed her dripping, soapy palm into his. He pulled her to her feet effortlessly.
"You said Gregory spoke about a warehouse," Dominic said, his dark eyes searching her face. "Where is my brother?"
Maeve wiped her cheek with her shoulder. "He didn't give an address in the room. But when he was talking to his guard twenty minutes ago near the hallway while you were waiting for the twelfth interpreter, he used a Romani shipping term for the old cold-storage facility near Pier 42."
Dominic’s eyes flared with a sudden, intense light.
"Pier 42," Dominic repeated. He turned to his head of security, a massive man named Marko. "Take six men. Burn Pier 42 to the ground if you have to, but bring Anthony back alive."
"Yes, Boss," Marko barked, sprinting out of the room with four armed men behind him.
Dominic looked back at Maeve. He looked at her worn canvas apron, her swollen knees, her faded shoes, and the incredible, fearless intelligence burning in her eyes.
"Twelve interpreters," Dominic murmured, a faint, shadowy smile touching his lips for the first time all night. "Twelve educated, highly paid men sat in that chair and lied to my face. And the only person in this city who told me the truth is the woman cleaning my floors."
"I don't like seeing people get set up," Maeve said plainly. "Especially not by family."
Dominic turned to two of his remaining guards. "Clear this room. Put Silvio and Charles in the basement. I'll deal with them once Anthony is safe."
He walked over to his chair, picked up his leather coat, and turned to Maeve.
"You're done cleaning for tonight, Miss Nolan," Dominic said. "Come with me."
"I have two more floors to mop," Maeve said automatically. "If I don't finish, the night manager dock my pay."
May you like
Dominic stopped, turning to look at her as if she had spoken in an unknown tongue. Then he chuckled—a low, genuine sound that sent a strange shiver down her spine.
"Maeve," Dominic said softly, "you don't work for the cleaning company anymore. As of five minutes ago, you are my chief advisor. And your rate is no longer fifteen dollars an hour."
