Chapter 5 - The Second Ledger
The Séance was closed when Thomas arrived at 3:18 in the morning.
That did not mean it was empty.
Thomas entered through the kitchen with Maya and Rosa behind him.
"Stay close," he said.
"To the bad man?" Rosa whispered.
"Tonight, yes."
The private lounge smelled exactly as Thomas remembered from childhood: old velvet, dust, and piano wood swollen by humidity.
He pulled the upright instrument away from the wall.
Behind it was a steel panel painted the same color as the plaster.
The dial turned beneath his fingers.
11.
4.
68.
His mother's birthday.
The lock clicked.
Thomas stopped breathing.
Inside the safe sat a leather envelope, a microcassette recorder, and one handwritten letter.
THOMAS.
His name.
Maya reached for the envelope.
Thomas caught her wrist.
"My mother. My letter."
"And my brother died looking for what is in that safe."
They stared at each other.
Rosa sighed loudly.
"Grown-ups fight too much."
Thomas released Maya.
He opened the letter.
The paper trembled once in his hand.
My son,
If you are reading this, either I failed or you finally became brave enough to ask what your father made you inherit.
Thomas stopped.
Maya said nothing.
He forced himself to continue.
Celeste wrote that Étienne Rousseau had built the modern organization through port theft, bribery, extortion, and disappearances. Henri Baptiste - Jacques's father - handled the violence. Celeste had recorded enough to prosecute both men and half the city government.
Then came the line that changed the room.
If I die before I can leave, do not believe it was an accident.
Rosa moved closer to Maya.
Thomas opened the leather envelope.
Inside were pages numbered eighty-seven through one hundred sixty-three.
The second half of the ledger.
Current names appeared in later handwriting.
Jacques Baptiste.
Judge Malcolm Landry.
Police Superintendent Evan Pike.
Councilman Rene Boudreaux.
And then, repeatedly:
T. ROUSSEAU AUTHORIZATION.
Thomas's jaw tightened.
"Those are forged."
Maya shook her head.
"Some are. Some aren't."
He looked at her.
"What does that mean?"
"It means your empire became useful cover. Jacques moved things through your companies because you stopped asking what every container held."
Thomas flipped pages.
Cash.
Weapons.
Undocumented migrants sold into forced labor.
Children moved through shell charities under falsified guardianship papers.
His stomach turned.
"No."
"You didn't order all of it," Maya said. "But your name made it possible."
Thomas looked at Rosa.
Four months in a clinic.
His signature.
His name.
His silence.
A floorboard creaked outside the lounge.
Thomas killed the lamp.
The door burst inward.
Gunfire shredded the piano.
Maya pulled Rosa behind the bar.
Thomas fired toward the muzzle flashes.
A man screamed.
Another shot cracked.
The ledger flew from Thomas's hand.
A gloved arm reached through the smoke, grabbed the leather envelope, and vanished into the hallway.
Thomas chased.
He reached the stairwell just in time to see the thief descend.
"Stop!"
The figure glanced back.
Thomas froze.
It was not Jacques.
It was Antoine.
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