Chapter 7 - The Ledger Cleared
Marcus stepped into the room, casually kicking Mick’s unconscious, bleeding body out of the way with the toe of his shoe.
“What do you want us to do with him, Boss?” Marcus asked, pulling a pair of heavy zip-ties from his jacket.
“Take him down to the basement of the Fourth Street warehouse,” Victor instructed without looking back, sliding his pistol back into its holster. “Tell the boys to hang him upside down until he remembers that my name doesn't get mentioned in children's hospitals. And burn his financial ledgers. Every single copy.”
“Consider it done,” Marcus said, nodding to the other enforcers. They grabbed Mick’s limp arms and dragged him out of the room, leaving a faint smear of blood across the white tile that Marcus wiped away with a paper towel on his way out.
The hospital room emptied in seconds, leaving only the steady beep of the heart monitor, the dim amber glow of the bedside lamp, and the silent, imposing presence of Victor Costello standing near the door.
Sadi slowly pushed herself up from the floor. She wiped her tear-stained face with the back of her sleeve, her raw, bleeding knuckles catching on the fabric.
She turned around to face the most feared man in the city.
“Why?” she whispered, her voice cracking. “You didn't have to do that. You could have just paid him off quietly. Why bring an army here? Why... why get involved?”
Victor walked slowly toward her, his footsteps making no sound on the floor. He stopped just a foot away, looking down at her with those inscrutable, slate-gray eyes.
“Because people who work in my house don't get hunted by sewer rats,” Victor said simply.
“I’m just a maid,” Sadi said, her voice trembling as she gestured to her ruined clothes and bleeding hands. “I scrub your floors. I clean up your messes. I’m nobody.”
“Nobody who works for Victor Costello is a nobody,” Victor replied, his tone hardening with absolute finality. He reached out, taking her right hand—the one with the worst chemical burns and cracked knuckles—and held it gently in his large, warm palm.
Sadi gasped, flinching slightly from the pain, but she didn't pull away.
“From this moment on,” Victor continued, his deep voice wrapping around her like a protective shield, “you don't scrub another floor. You don't bleach another stain. And you certainly never worry about hospital bills again.”
“What... what are you saying?” Sadi breathed.
“I’m saying your brother’s treatment is fully covered by the Castello Foundation, effective immediately,” Victor said. “And you are moving out of that drafty tenement apartment on the east side into the guest suites on the third floor of the estate.”
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Sadi stared at him, bewildered, terrified, and overwhelmed. “I can’t do that. I’m an employee—!”
“You were an employee,” Victor corrected softly. He reached up, his thumb gently brushing a stray tear from her cheek. “Tonight, the whole city is going to find out who Sadi Hayes is. Because anyone who tries to touch what belongs to me... learns what happens when they wake the beast.”
