Silas Vane liked to start his mornings in the quiet. No calls, no emails, just the low hum of the Thames below his Canary Wharf office and the first cigarette of the day burning down in the ashtray his wife pretended not to know about. Tuesday had been no different. He'd arrived at six, beaten his assistant by two hours, and settled into the leather chair with the kind of satisfaction that came from believing, even briefly, that the world was still his to command.
That illusion lasted forty-three minutes.
The first indicator arrived not as a phone call or an urgent message, but as a simple automated alert from his private banking portal in Nicosia. His hand was halfway to his coffee cup when the notification icon pulsed red on his screen. He clicked it without thinking, the way one checks a weather report, and then his fingers stopped moving.
*Account Access Restricted. Regulatory Inquiry in Progress. Please Contact Your Relationship Manager.*
