Chapter 5 - The War at The PinnacleThe interior of the delivery van was warm, smelling of diesel fuel and fresh leather.
Immani lay on the corrugated metal floor, gasping for air, her chest heaving as if she had just run ten miles through sand. Her hands were bruised, her knees bled through her torn pants, but her pocket was heavy.
Cade dropped down beside her, ignoring the sharp spike of pain in his own ribs, and pulled her up into his arms.
"Are you hit?" he asked frantically, his hands checking her shoulders, her arms, her back. "Immani! Did they shoot you?"
"No," she wheezed, sitting up and pushing her hair out of her face. "No... I'm okay."
She reached into her coat, pulled out the heavy leather ledger and the silver flash drive, and slammed them into his chest.
"Here," she panted, half-laughing, half-crying. "Here's your damn book. Next time you want something from a warehouse, hire a professional."
Cade looked at the ledger in his hands. Then he looked at her.
Without a word, he pulled her into him, wrapping his long arms around her shoulders, burying his face into the side of her neck. He held her tight—so tight she could feel the rapid, furious beat of his heart against her cheek.
"You're incredible," he whispered into her hair, his voice thick with an emotion he couldn't hide. "You have no idea what you just did."
"I just hit a mobster with a lamp," she muttered, though she didn't pull away. She wrapped her arms around his waist, resting her head against his chest, letting his warmth fill the cold void inside her. "Where are we going now?"
Cade pulled back slightly, his eyes cold and dark with a newfound, lethal purpose.
"The Pinnacle," he said.
Immani blinked. "What? The Pinnacle? Cade, that's where your brother is!"
"Exactly," Cade said, plugging the silver flash drive into a rugged laptop sitting on the van’s bench seat. "Julian called an emergency meeting of the syndicate heads in the penthouse suite at midnight. He thinks he's going to present his forged documents and be crowned the new boss of Chicago."
He typed rapidly with one hand, his eyes reflecting the bright blue light of the screen.
"This flash drive contains the raw audio files from the security suite in Julian's house," Cade explained, a ruthless smile playing on his lips. "It has him planning my assassination with the Detroit syndicate's lieutenant. Once I play this for the old bosses, Julian won't just lose his bid for power... he'll be executed before he reaches the lobby."
"And how are you getting into the penthouse?" Immani asked, standing up shakily as the van turned onto Michigan Avenue. "The private elevators require a biometric palm scan. Julian has revoked your access by now."
Cade looked up at her, his dark eyes filled with absolute trust.
"The private elevators do," Cade agreed softly. "But the service elevators don't. They use a manual bypass key kept in the basement custodial room."
Immani let out a long, slow breath.
"The yellow key," she whispered. "Behind the breaker panel in my supply room."
"Can you get us in through the service dock?" Cade asked.
Immani looked out the van's rear window. Through the blinding snow, the towering glass spire of The Pinnacle rose ninety stories into the dark sky—the place where she had spent four years being invisible, polishing marble for men who thought they owned the world.
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She reached down, grabbed her broken backpack, and pulled out her brass key ring.
"I don't just know how to get us in," she said, her voice dropping into a quiet, unstoppable steel. "I know how to turn off the lights on every floor except the top one. Let's go see your brother."
