Luca swiped his access card across the reader.
A thin electronic chime. The door unlocked.
A quiet research compound outside Vancouver, by the sea.
Almost eleven.
The lab was still awake,
fluorescent light licking the floor in long, pale strips.
Glass slides and crumpled notes cluttered the desk.
Off to one side—an envelope, sitting alone.
Inside: a schematic for nano-capsules—
boosting membrane permeability,
rewiring neurotransmitter pathways.
Cold lines and numbers.
Exactly what he'd been looking for.
His gaze shifted, just barely.
If this went to market…
The math flashed through his head like lightning—
figures, buyers, markets, the obstacles to be erased.
A door opened behind him.
"You're still here?"
Daniel Nam. Son of the doctors.
White coat, quick glance at the envelope in Luca's hand.
Luca closed it without changing expression.
"Last day."
Daniel tilted his head.
"Really?"
"Yeah...Just decided it's time to go home."
His voice was flat.
He slid the envelope deep into his bag and walked out.
Later that night,
at Vancouver International,
he boarded a private jet for Italy without a word of goodbye.
Malpensa Arrival
Malpensa's night air was dry.
Cool wind slid over the tarmac.
A black sedan waited.
The driver glanced back.
"How was the trip?"
"Got what I came for."
The car pulled north toward the estate.
Streetlights stretched and fell away along the window glass.
Luca took out a satellite phone.
Three rings.
A voice from Canada.
"Yes, boss."
"Rugate Highway. That curve—you know it?"
"Yes, sir."
"Wait for rain. Make it clean. No traces."
He ended the call, eyes fixed on the dark beyond the glass.
In his mind, the scene was already drawn:
the wet curve, the broken guardrail,
the car tumbling down into nothing.
Rain Protocol
Vancouver winters were always wet.
The sky, a sunken slate. Even the streetlights bled into the rain.
Luca sat in the back of a black SUV, eyes on the window.
The wipers moved in steady arcs,
each pass revealing streaks of neon in the puddled road
before the water swallowed them again.
When they arrived, two men were already waiting.
Black raincoats.
Hats pulled low.
An old sedan idling at the shoulder.
The rain thickened, heavy enough to drum on metal.
Tires hissed through standing water.
In the distance—a grey SUV approached.
Inside, Dr. Adrian Nam and Dr. Claire Lee.
One of Luca's men stepped forward, tilting a metal can.
Oil spilled across the curve, vanishing into the wet.
A trap the night wouldn't betray.
The SUV hit the bend.
The tires screamed.
The vehicle slid, slammed the guardrail—
metal shriek, glass shatter—
then the long, hollow roar of something falling.
It was over in less than ten seconds.