27 Hours Earlier

Eleven hours. That number pulsed behind Vincent’s eyes like a migraine. Tight and unrelenting. It was the only thing his mind could track. Not votes. Not foreign policy. Not even his own reflection in the mirror of power he had so carefully constructed over decades.

His son had been gone for eleven hours. And still, no one could tell him where.

He stood motionless in his private study, surrounded by mahogany and silence. The drapes hadn’t been drawn. The light in the room had shifted, going from grey to golden. The sun was rising, but he had barely slept. His security detail had been doubled. His schedule cleared. His nerves, however, refused to steady.

He leaned one hand on the fireplace mantel, the other wrapped tightly around a glass of brandy, untouched. There was no anger. No demands. No grandstanding. Just the vague sense of disarray where control used to be.

Meredith, his secretary, entered the room, an envelope pressed firmly to her chest. Her jaw was clenched like a steel trap, a wordless warning that something was very wrong.

He didn’t look at her. “Report.”

“You were right to be concerned. We’ve verified the location. Jasper was abducted. It happened in the alley directly beneath the penthouse.” A subtle nervousness edged her voice, the weight of confirmation heavier than suspicion.

Vincent blinked once.

“The alley?” How in God’s name did his son end up in an alley?

“Yes, sir,” she answered quietly. “He likely left the gala alone. His driver and guard have already been accounted for. The security feed was corrupted. Clean erase. Even the sensor grid shows a data blackout. We have no way of knowing for sure.”

Vincent closed his eyes.

He pictured the alley, narrow and choked with grime, lined with crumbling brick and oil stained concrete, half swallowed by the high gloss polish of Sinclair Tower. The penthouse sat forty four floors above it, untouchable. And yet someone had touched.

“And Sierra? Delta?” he asked. 

“Both teams were found unconscious inside the building earlier this morning, just before dawn.” A crease formed between her eyebrows. “The condition they were in suggests they were taken out by someone with a highly disciplined, tactical background, possibly military.”

Vincent nodded. “Did they give a statement?”

“Yes. At 7:48 PM, Sierra team went dark. Their last transmission came from inside the building, reporting unidentified movement and a breach of the security perimeter. Communications were lost two minutes before the elevator reached the ground floor. Delta intercepted fragmented signals indicating Sierra was being engaged and moved to assist, but arrived too late. Sierra was already down. The assailant remains unidentified, with no visual confirmation.”

Vincent pinched the bridge of his nose. “They got inside,” Vincent murmured. “Inside my building.”

Meredith said nothing.

“There are four external access points to that alley,” Vincent went on. “Two are under constant surveillance. The third was rerouted for construction. The fourth…”

“Fire exit,” Meredith finished. “Already scrubbed. There was no footage. The motion sensor activated at 8:21, yet no alert was registered by security.”

“And Jasper’s phone?” he asked incredulously.

“Offline at 8:25. It was found shattered in the alley.”

Vincent finally turned to face her. “This wasn’t random.”

“No, sir.” She shook her head.

“Whoever did this knew the layout. The routine. The timing.”

“Yes,” she confirmed. “Whoever planned this, planned it well.”

He moved to the desk and placed the glass down. “Have we considered internal breach?”

“We’re running loyalty sweeps. Every staff member, every guard. Everyone’s being pulled.”

Vincent exhaled through his nose. “And Marcus?”

“He activated the Black Set an hour ago. No trail yet.”

He gave a slow nod. Marcus Cain was efficient. Brutal when necessary. And this required brutality.

He wasn’t part of security. He was a tool, used when politics failed and deniability was more valuable than truth. Vincent gave the order. Cain delivered the result.

Vincent turned his attention to the single photo on his desk. It was Jasper, younger, laughing on the deck of a yacht. One of the last moments before the boy had turned into something stubborn and unpredictable. Vincent had never liked softness. He’d raised Jasper to be tough. And now, he had vanished in the dark beneath his own fortress.

It felt like war.

“Any digital chatter?” he asked.

Meredith hesitated. “One lead. A dark net post from an unmarked account. No name, no trace. The message was deleted within minutes, but one of our AIs flagged it just before it was purged, retrieving it from a dormant cache the system didn’t even know was active. The message stated, The son of the beast walks blind. Watch the tower fall.”

His eyes narrowed. “Time stamp?”

“Two hours after the abduction.”

No ransom. No manifesto. Just a line designed to provoke. He tapped the desk with one finger.

“They’re not doing this for money,” he said. “And they’re not doing it for show. This was personal.”

Meredith shifted her stance. “There’s talk that Velvet Chain may be involved.”

The name sat heavy in the air.

Vincent didn’t speak immediately.

Velvet Chain. Ghosts carved from darkness, slipping through firewalls like poison in the veins of the digital world. A name spoken like a curse in the underworld of encrypted whispers. They didn’t make threats. They made examples.

For years, Vincent scoffed at the rumors. He knew the name and their reputation, but they had never crossed his path or that of his closest partners. Still, the stories persisted. Velvet Chain lurked behind every collapse, every failed deal, always just out of reach. A silent threat waiting for the right moment to strike.

The warnings had always been there, quiet, insistent, but he had chosen to ignore them.

And now?

Someone had walked straight into his tower, under forty four floors of wealth and watchful eyes, and stolen the thing he still dared to care about.

Jasper.

His only child.

“They wanted me to know I never saw them coming. That they were always one step ahead, watching, waiting. And I let him walk out like he wasn’t mine to protect!” Vincent snapped.

“Given the circumstances, his vulnerability was unavoidable,” Meredith said.

Vincent turned sharply. “He was never vulnerable. He was reckless.”

She didn’t respond. She knew better than to argue. Knew that Vincent Sinclair, the man who once ordered a city wide blackout to shield a secret arms deal, was not someone who tolerated weakness. Especially not his own.

He exhaled. “Any word from the Justice Department?”

“They’re watching. No contact yet. They’re hoping this doesn’t land on their desk.”

“It won’t,” he said. “I’ll clean it before it does.”

And he would. He had built an empire on secrets. This would be no different. Except this time, it wasn’t just about erasing threats. It was about finding one boy in a sea of shadows. A boy who looked too much like his mother when he was scared.

Vincent poured another glass. This time, he took a drink. The burn was the only relief in this mess.

Meredith lingered by the edge of the desk, and hesitantly placed the envelope on top of it. 

“This was recovered approximately an hour ago,” she said carefully. “It was found near a conduit panel on sub level three, the old maintenance access next to the utility stairwell. The door requires clearance, but it hasn’t been checked in weeks. Most of the new teams don’t even have it on their sweep rotations.”

Vincent looked up, his brow tense. “That stairwell isn’t on the standard patrol?”

“Not since the tower switched over to the new sensor grid. It was marked for rerouting during the last audit, but the order was never processed. Someone knew that. Knew how outdated our coverage was in that corner.” Her eyes were filled with unease. 

“And they used it.”

“Yes,” she said. “They placed it precisely where someone doing a full sweep would find it, but not immediately.”

Vincent picked up the envelope and examined it.

“They weren’t just showing us they got in,” he muttered. “They were showing us how blind we are.”

He opened it slowly. Inside was a photo of Jasper lying on a battered military cot in a concrete room. Rusted metal bars and heavy chains mounted to the walls surrounded him.

There was no note, no instructions. Just proof that Jasper Sinclair was alive. Vincent stared at it for a long time, not because of fear, but fury.

They wanted him to see. Not panic. Not plead. See.

And Vincent did. He saw the threat, the insult, and most of all, he saw the game beginning.

He set the envelope down, his eyes lingering on the photo once more before rising to meet Meredith’s.

“This tower’s compromised,” he said quietly. “We need to move operations, somewhere secure, where they can’t touch us but still reach me. Coordinate with the team. Make sure the fallback location is ready. And keep the lines open. No surprises.”

Meredith nodded, already reaching for her comms.

“And call in some favors. Get me eyes on every route in and out of the city. Scan for heat signatures in abandoned industrial sites. Cross reference power usage spikes. Warehouse grids. I want real time intel. Secure satellite access if you have to. I’ll handle the paperwork later.”

“I’ll make it happen,” she said confidently.

He paused. “Find Velvet Chain’s last digital signature. I want a location, signals, and any dark web chatter.”

“You think they left one?”

“I think everyone leaves something,” Vincent said. “Even ghosts.”

Meredith nodded and turned to leave.

“Meredith,” he added, voice lower.

She looked back.

“Inform Marcus that if any evidence arises showing my son has been harmed,” Vincent said quietly, “I want the one responsible delivered to me alive.”

“Why alive?” she asked.

Vincent smiled faintly.

“So I can look them in the eye when I end the game.”