Part 1 The world knows me as Marcus Adams. The name is on buildings, on stock tickers, on charity galas. I own cities,…

Part 1 The laughter in the private dining room of Boston’s Damascus Rose was as sharp and cold as breaking glass. I kept…

Part 1 The smell of stale beer and disinfectant. That’s all I could think about. My shift at the grocery store had run…

Part 1 Morning sunlight knifed through the tall windows of Fort Bragg’s administrative building and threw hard squares across the polished linoleum like…

Part 1 It was one of those Saturday mornings that feels too perfect, like a painting someone is trying to sell you. 8:04…

Part 1 The alarm was a gunshot in the dark. 6:00 AM. My fingers fumbled, smashing the button, desperate for five more seconds.…

Part 1 He shoved my graduation cake right off the table. Frosting splattered across the patio stones. My ten-year-old nephew looked at the…

Part 1 The silence in my mansion is the loudest thing I own. It’s a thick, suffocating velvet, paid for by a real…

Part 1 The first rule of my world is that silence is the sound of efficiency. My mansion in the Hamptons wasn’t a…

Part 1 In New York City, power isn’t just seen; it’s inhaled. At Veritas, the restaurant where I worked, it hung thick in…