Chapter 229: Born Ready
THIRD PERSON’S POV.
After three days of relentless surveillance and hacking into every available street camera in Cedarville in an attempt to identify the getaway vehicle used to transport Serena, Jake and his men had reached a dead end. Even Damian’s police contacts were struggling to find a DNA match for the fingerprints recovered from Serena’s abandoned car.
Every lead they chased either went cold or led nowhere.
It was as though Serena had been taken by ghosts, and with each passing day, everyone around Damian was slowly beginning to lose hope that she would ever be found.
Not Damian, though.
He couldn’t afford to lose hope because hope was the only thing keeping him from completely unraveling.
Every morning he convinced himself she was still alive.
Every night he repeated that same lie until exhaustion finally forced him to close his eyes for an hour or two before he was searching again.
On the fourth day, however, things finally began to look up.
A neatly wrapped package arrived at Crowne Manor addressed personally to Damian.
He couldn’t think of anyone who would be sending him a package at such a critical moment, so suspicion settled in long before he even touched the box.
“Did you scan it for explosives?” he asked Jake as he accepted the white parcel from his hands.
“Yes, sir.” Jake nodded. “We scanned it for explosives, chemicals, biological agents and everything we could think of. It came back completely clean.”
His expression remained uneasy. “I still find it strange that there’s no return address.”
Jake glanced at the package before looking back at Damian. “Would you like me to open it for you, sir?”
“No.” Damian shook his head. “It was addressed to me personally, so I’ll be the one to open it.”
He placed the box carefully on the desk before retrieving a pair of scissors from the top drawer.
“Stand back,” he instructed Oscar and Jake.
Neither man argued.
Damian carefully sliced through the wrapping before slowly lifting the lid.
His breathing stopped. “What the fuck is that?”
Oscar and Jake immediately stepped closer to look inside.
“It…” Jake frowned. “It looks like a chunk of hair.”
Damian slowly reached into the box and lifted the brown strands with trembling fingers.
His face drained of color.
His thumb gently brushed over the soft strands as though trying to convince himself he was mistaken.
He wasn’t. “It’s Serena’s.” He said, his voice barely rose above a whisper. “I’d recognize her hair anywhere.”
Neither Oscar nor Jake spoke, neither knew what to say.
“There’s a note in here too,” Oscar finally murmured, carefully peeling an envelope that had been glued beneath the lid.
He looked toward Damian. “Do you want to read it… or should I?” The fear in his voice was impossible to hide.
“I’ll read it.” Damian took the card from him with unsteady hands and unfolded it.
He swallowed before reading aloud.
I HAVE TAKEN SOMETHING PRECIOUS TO YOU, JUST AS YOU TOOK SOMETHING PRECIOUS FROM YEARS AGO.RETURN IT, AND I JUST MAY RETURN YOURS.
DO OTHERWISE AND I WILL KEEP SENDING PIECES OF YOUR WIFE TO YOU UNTIL THERE'S NOTHING LEFT OF HER.
~Dominic Moretti
Silence swallowed the room as the words lingered in the air long after Damian stopped reading.
Oscar felt the blood drain from his face. “Dominic has Serena.” He murmured as if saying the words aloud would make them any less true.
Jake immediately sprang into action. “At least now we have a target and know exactly who to be searching for, I need to update my men.” He said before quietly exiting the room in quick purposeful strides.
Once they were alone, Oscar turned to Damian. “What precious thing of Dominic’s did you take years ago?”
Damian remained silent for a few seconds more before finally snapping out of his trance.
He returned the hair back into the gift box it had arrived in and slowly covered it up before responding to Oscar.
“After my father died and shut down the prostitution ring he owned, Dominic was livid. He insisted that the money and the women be transferred to him since he was my father’s business partner,” Damian let out a weary sigh.
“But I wanted no part in that line of business anymore,” he continued, “neither did I want my family name to remain tied to that horrible involved in such a horrible act anymore so I donated all the business proceeds to a charity and locked up documents to the brothel and strip clubs and all the official seals in a safety deposit box. That’s what Dominic wants, he still believes they are his right.”
Oscar slowly rubbed the back of his neck, “so what are you going to do, will you give the documents and seal back to him?”
“No,” Damian replied immediately as if the request wasn’t even worthy of a second thought. “I’ve disappointed Serena enough as it is, if she finds out I ruined a bunch of women’s lives just to save hers, she will actually never speak to me again.” He said.
“But I know Dominic to be a man of his words so now we have to make sure we find Serena before he makes good on his promise."
Oscar nodded and together they walked out of the study to join the others in finding a way to save Mrs Crowne.
~ ~ ~
The basement of Crowne Manor had been transformed into a fully operational surveillance center. Giant monitors covered the walls, displaying live satellite feeds, traffic cameras, police databases and maps littered with colored markers. Phones rang constantly while analysts moved from one workstation to another, calling out updates as fresh intelligence poured in.
The atmosphere was tense because now everyone knew time was running out.
Damian had barely looked away from one of the monitors when two federal agents strode into the room.
The moment he recognized them, he hurried over.
“Mark. Walter. Welcome,” he greeted, exchanging handshakes with both men. “Please tell me you have some good news for me.”
Mark nodded with a smile, “yesterday we finally found a DNA match from one of the samples we pulled from your wife’s car but we didn’t want to tell you and her your hopes up until we found the suspect.”
“Yeah,” Walter picked up where his partner left off. “We put out a BOLO search with the suspect's information and one of our units spotted him today, and after tailing him. We finally know where Mrs Crowne is being held.”
For the first time in four days, genuine hope flashed across Damian’s face.
“Oh…” He nearly laughed from relief. “That’s incredible.”
He immediately turned toward Jake and his men already gathered around the surveillance screens. “Pack your things boys, we move now.”
“Exactly,” Mark agreed, “get your men ready Mr Crowne. His expression turned deadly serious.
“This is about to become a war.”
A slow, determined smile spread across Damian’s face.
“We were born ready.”