"She was seventeen," Daithí says.
"Yes."
"She started this when she was seventeen."
"Earlier, probably. The control of Tony likely started when the affair started. Whenever that was."
Daithí pushes back from the table and stands. He walks to the window and stands there with his back to the room, I watch his shoulders rise and fall rapidly as he tries to rein in his anger.
"The cross-family losses make sense now," Prior says. "She had Tony for Delaney’s intelligence, Bruno for Mariano’s, and Rurik is the Morozov access point. All three feed Frederick Hightower." He pauses. "What's he building with it?"
"That's what we don't know yet," Tempest says. "The acquisitions, the shell companies, the financial positioning, it all points to something large. Something that requires significant infrastructure to execute. My working theory is that he's been building a parallel operation. Something that will allow him to position himself as the dominant economic force in the territories the Syndicate controls. Not by taking the Syndicate down, but by making himself indispensable to whoever is left standing."
"He's betting on the Syndicate weakening," I say.
"He's been helping it weaken," Tempest says. "The leaks weren't just about financial gain. They were designed to create instability. Distrust between families. Gaps in the alliance structure. Spaces where his operation can move in while everyone's fighting each other."
"We need to find out if Bruno is truly your leak, Lorenzo,” Daithí says, rejoining the conversation. “And we need to figure out who the leak within the King’s organization is.”
"I’m working on it,” Prior assures us. “No information has been leaked within my organization for weeks. Ever since we stopped sharing information, that is.”
That’s the right way to handle things. “Which means everyone is on an information diet. Every organization needs to only have meetings with family and that’s it. It’s a need to know basis and that way you can weed out the traitor,” I tell them and watch Ciro’s face split into a grin.
“What about the Morozov’s?” Marco questions.
“That’s for another day,” I say. I have no intention of meeting with Olezka. His son Danil, on the other hand is another story. But we’ll see what we uncover, we need as much information as possible before we bring it to him.
The meeting finishes and everyone leaves, except Daithí. "I should have seen it," he says, the moment my office door closes.
"Tony has thirty years of being your father’s right-hand man. He earned that trust at some point in his life, and he knew no one would look at him being the source of the leak.”
"I was looking." He grunts. "I was looking at everyone, running through every person with enough access. I kept dismissing Tony because..." He stops and shakes his head. "Because he buried his daughter. I watched that man bury his daughter and I thought..." He cuts off, unable to finish it.
"You thought his grief made him loyal."
"Yes." His jaw tightens. "It was the opposite. His guilt kept him exactly where Daire needed him."
Daithí looks at me. "He's in my father's house and he's sitting in meetings. Every day we leave him there is another day he can pass information."
"I know." I hold his gaze. "Which is why we're done speculating."
Daithí's expression hardens. "What are you thinking?"
"We stop guessing." I glance at the file still sitting on the table. "We have Frederick." I tap the folder. "We have Daire." Another tap. "We have enough pieces to know there's a bigger picture." I lean back in my chair. "But Tony is the one sitting in the middle of it."
Daithí nods slowly. "He knows something."
"He knows a lot."
"And if he doesn't want to tell us?" Daithí questions.
A smile pulls at my mouth. "Then we'll persuade him."
Daithí gets to his feet. "When?"
I stand. "Now."
The car is waiting outside for us. Marco is behind the wheel, ready as always. I slide into the back seat, and Daithí gets in beside me. Marco pulls out of the drive.
