Chapter 2 - Unravelling the Seams
“Cut them open,” Luca commanded.
“Wait! Luca, no!” Vivien shrieked, finally losing her composure entirely. She lunged forward, grabbing Luca’s arm. “You can’t let a seamstress butcher your wedding suit! The ceremony is in three days! The Times is running a four-page spread! If you destroy that suit, you’ll look like a madman!”
“If I walk into that cathedral with three military-grade tracking and audio bugs sewn into my clothes, I won’t make it to the altar alive, Vivien,” Luca replied, his voice chillingly flat. He peeled her fingers off his arm as if she were made of dirt. “Step back.”
I didn't wait for permission.
I picked up the jacket, laid the heavy black wool flat against the velvet-topped table, and slid the blade of my shears into the delicate pick-stitching along the right lapel.
Rip.
The sound of silk tearing echoed in the silent room. I peeled back the canvas interlining—horsehair canvas, the kind used in traditional Savile Row tailoring. Hidden inside a hollowed-out channel between the layers was a second device: a micro-microphone wired with a flexible lithium-ion battery wafer.
The room seemed to run out of air.
One of the armed bodyguards near the door unclipped his holster with a sharp click.
I didn't stop. I moved down to the center back seam, right between the shoulder blades—the exact spot where a man sits against a high-backed leather chair in a private office or a limousine.
Snip.
I pulled open the vent lining. A third device, slightly larger, rolled out onto the table. It was a GPS transponder with an encrypted satellite uplink.
Silence descended on the penthouse—a heavy, suffocating silence broken only by the hum of the climate control system.
Luca looked down at the three pieces of hardware lined up on the wood. Then, slowly, he raised his head. His eyes weren't looking at me anymore. They were locked on Bastion Vera and Vivien Cross.
“Three bugs,” Luca whispered. “Custom-installed. In garments that only left the Milan flagship yesterday and went straight to my private vault.”
Bastion collapsed backward into a velvet armchair, clutching his head. “I swear to God, Luca, I didn't know! I swear! It must have been an infiltrator in the Milan workshop! It was the union workers! Or the logistics company!”
“The logistics company is owned by the Moretti syndicate, Bastion,” Luca reminded him softly. “Nothing moves without my sign-off. Which means the breach happened here. In New York. In your private back room.”
Vivien’s face drained of all color. She began backing toward the private elevator, her heels clicking frantically.
“Well,” Vivien forced a brittle, hysterical laugh, her hands shaking as she clutched her handbag. “This has been... quite a misunderstanding. Clearly, security needs to handle this. I’ll just wait downstairs in the car, Luca. Call me when you’ve sorted out your paranoid delusions—”
“Guard the elevator,” Luca said without raising his voice.
The two heavily armed guards moved instantly, positioning themselves in front of the brass elevator doors, blocking her path.
Vivien hit the wall, her eyes wide with animal panic. “You can’t do this to me! My family—!”
“Your family’s shipping empire went bankrupt six months ago, Vivien,” Luca interrupted, stepping toward her like a shadow swallowing the light. “I’m the one who secretly bought your father’s debts to keep you out of federal prison. I am the only reason you are standing in this room wearing fifty thousand dollars worth of diamonds.”
Vivien froze, her lower lip trembling.
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“And yet,” Luca continued, closing the distance until he was towering over her, “someone wanted to know every word I said, every meeting I attended, and every move I made on the eve of our corporate merger. Someone who had access to my private fittings. Someone who stood right beside me while I was measured.”
He turned his dark, lethal gaze from Vivien to Bastion, and finally back to me.
