Alex still remembered the smell of sawdust and the weight of a hammer that was far too heavy for his seven-year-old hands. He'd been trying to build a birdhouse one summer at the cabin, but was mostly just mangling a piece of pine, until Tony sat down in the grass beside him.
Tony hadn't taken over. He'd simply rested his hand over Alex's to steady the swing. "It's all in the grip, Mijo," he'd said, his voice filled with encouragement. He had that easy, crooked grin lighting up his face.
Back then, even though Alex's father had co-founded the company, Tony was the undisputed sun that everyone else orbited. He was the visionary who could walk into any room and own it by simply existing. Alex had worshipped that. And that was exactly what Alex wanted to be. It was the reason, after graduation, he didn't even think twice about moving in with Tony for a while before grad school. He wanted to soak up every bit of that magic, and learn how to be the boss. To him, Tony was the blueprint of a perfect man.
But watching Tony now, across the crowded museum, that memory felt like it belonged to a different life, or perhaps a different person entirely.
Alex leaned against a marble pillar, a glass of untouched champagne in his hand. How could he reconcile this cold, possessive figure for the man who had turned the living room into a fort using every couch cushion in the house and engaged in a relentless, three-day Nerf gun battle that left them both breathless with laughter or the man who had taught him the true meaning of devotion, compassion and care when he saw how he never left Isabella's bedside during her final days.
Alex's gaze lingered on them; the way Emily smiled for the crowd. It was something she had perfected after many rehearsals. And Tony? his hand seemed like it was permanently glued to her waist. When his hand slid lower, it was possessive and blunt, lacking any tenderness. Alex saw Emily visibly stiffen.
A knot tightened in his chest. His jaw locked as a memory surfaced: Tony used to hold Isabella the exact same way at these gatherings. He had thought it was love that made them inseparable. But now, having seen him treat Emily like a piece of property for display and power, he was beginning to reevaluate all that he thought of his 'dearest' Uncle Tony.
Was Tony always this way? Controlling in private while playing the doting husband in public? Or had something vital snapped when Isabella died, leaving behind a man devoid of any emotions and ruthless in dealing with others.
Near the center of the gallery, the evening's lead fundraiser, a tall woman named Eleanor wearing a sharp tuxedo, approached them.
"Mr. Torredo, a word?" she asked, her voice carrying warmth. "We are so grateful for your continued patronage."
Tony tightened his grip on Emily, pulling her close to himself. "It's a cause close to my heart," he said, his charismatic voice filling the immediate space. He looked down at Emily, his eyes crinkling in a way that looked like affection to anyone who wasn't paying attention. "In fact, I'd like to double my commitment tonight. A million-dollar endowment for the wing in the name of my late wife, Isabella. She always did have a soft spot for the arts."
Eleanor gasped, her face lighting up. "That is incredibly generous, Tony. Isabella would be so proud."
Beside him, Emily was still like a statue. She didn't look at Eleanor nor did she look at the crowd admiring them. She kept her eyes fixed on a blank spot on the wall, her smile frozen and brittle. To the room, Tony was the golden-hearted man who still had reverence for his first wife. To Alex, he looked like a man using a dead woman's name to build his reputation silence the wife he currently owned.
"You look like you're about to punch a hole in the wall," Victoria said, appearing at his side.
Alex jerked his gaze away, his heart beating fast. Beside him, Victoria looked effortlessly elegant in a sapphire silk dress.
She tracked his eyes across the room to where Tony was now being congratulated by a circle of elite men and women and Emily stood. She turned back to Alex with a conspiratorial smirk. "I know, right? It's almost embarrassing. He could do so much better than her."
Alex felt a flash of defensive heat for Emily, but he clamped down on it and forced a thin, hollow smile.
"How about we take a raincheck on this and go to my place? I have a vintage Bordeaux that's much better than this swill," she asked, her voice sultry.
Alex looked at his watch. "I can't, Victoria."
She raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Can't or don't want to? You seem distant. What is it about?"
Alex's eyes darted through the crowd, his mind racing to construct a good lie. He spotted Tony and Emily huddled in front of another painting, Tony's laughter echoing through the room.
"I have an errand to run for Tony," he blurted.
"I'll tag along," she offered, sliding her hand into his. "We can head to my place after."
"It's private," he snapped, a little too quickly.
The air between them chilled instantly. Victoria's expression flattened and her hand slipped away from his. "Oh. Right."
"I'll call you tomorrow. I promise." He leaned in and pressed a dry, distracted kiss to her cheek.
He didn't wait to see the hurt or the suspicion on her face. He pushed through the heavy glass doors and broke into the cool night air, his pace quickening toward the parking lot. He just needed to get there before the clock ran out.
***
The Torredo Global Complex loomed like a glass monolith against the skyline.
Inside, the door to Tony's office gave a traitorous creak as Alex slipped through the gap. He stood still for a heartbeat, eyes scouring the room for a moment, paralyzed by the sheer weight of the betrayal he was about to commit.
He began tearing through the filing cabinets. The shuffle of paper was the only sound in the room, but the folders were useless. He lunged for the main desk drawer and yanked, but it refused to budge, locked tight.
Breathless, Alex sank into Tony's heavy leather chair; the seat he'd spent years imagining would be his one day. With trembling hands, he punched in the password by memory, his fingers moving in across the mechanical keys. The monitor flared to life, casting a blue glow over his face. He began to sweep through the digital archives, going through endless rows of encrypted files. Just as his hope began to fray, he spotted it. A buried directory that shouldn't have existed.
Project Legacy
Alex's throat went dry, the air in the office was suddenly dry and thick.
The password prompt blinked back at him. He cleared his throat then tried his first password. Access Denied. He tried a variation of Isabella's name. Access Denied. A crimson warning flared: One attempt remaining.
He closed his eyes, his mind conjuring the image of Emily, the fear in her eyes when Tony held her father's debt over her like a gun.
Alex's hand swiped desperately across the smooth, polished mahogany of the desk surface, stalling as his fingers caught on a slight unevenness underneath the front lip of the heavy desk.
He threw his eyes open at once and assessed it.
It was a small, rough indentation, barely tactile; the kind of hidden niche an architect might build into a custom piece.
He pried at the wood, and a tiny compartment clicked open, revealing an old, tarnished brass plumb bob; a tool used by builders to ensure a wall is perfectly vertical.
Etched into the side of the brass, nearly worn away by years of Tony's thumb rubbing against it, is a single word and a string of coordinates:
PHOENIX - 44.3148, -71.3032
The realization hits Alex like a physical blow. Those were the coordinates for the exact spot where of the cabin where he built the bird cage and Tony had told him everything was 'all in the grip.' And Phoenix? Was Isabella's favorite bird.
Alex turned back to the monitor, his final attempt. He typed: PHOENIX - 44.3148, -71.3032
The screen flickered, then yielded. Access Granted.
A flood of files hit the monitor. He opened the documents one after the other, his eyes scanning through rapidly. His breath seized at the sight of the original, unedited surveyors assessment and Geotechnical Engineer's report. It has been written in clear terms that the site was not for for such construction work but somehow, Torredo company had started work on the site and months later brought in Emily's father as a small contractor.
He scanned through more documents and realized that Tony had indeed set up Lawson Holdings to take the fall for his fatal choice. Marrying Emily was indeed a collateral, but not to ensure Lawson provided free labor for five years but to ensure he cages them and ultimately acquires Lawson Holdings.
"Emily needs to see this," Alex mustered
He jammed a flash drive into the port. The progress bar was a tortoise, crawling with agonizing indifference. 60%... 75%... 90%...
The heavy oak door gave a low, drawn-out creak.
"Looking for something, Alex?"
The voice wasn't Tony's. It was sharper and colder, slicing through the silence like a razor. Alex froze, the blue light of the stolen data dancing in his wide eyes as a long shadow stretched across the mahogany desk, swallowing the keyboard.