The private terminal at the city's international airport was silent, save for the low hum of the air conditioning and the distant whistle of a departing jet. Xavier stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, his hands clasped behind his back, watching a sleek, unmarked Gulfstream taxi toward the hangar. Beside him, Seraphina looked out at the tarmac, her signature ivory trench coat draped over her shoulders like a cape.
"You're nervous," she observed, her voice barely a whisper.
"Not nervous," Xavier corrected, his eyes never leaving the plane. "Alert. The men on that plane don't come to this side of the world for vacations. They are the brothers I chose when I had no one. They are the shadows that kept me alive in Lagos when Silas's men were hunting my father's ghost."
The stairs of the jet lowered, and three figures stepped out. They didn't look like the polished security contractors of Vane Global. They wore dark denim, heavy boots, and leather jackets that had seen years of sun and rain. The man in the lead was Chidi, a mountain of a man with a scar running through his left eyebrow and eyes that seemed to record everything in a single glance. Behind him were Efe, the tech specialist who could hack a government mainframe from a burner phone, and Zane, the silent marksman who moved with the grace of a panther.
As they approached the terminal doors, Chidi stopped, looking at Xavier with a slow, wide grin that revealed a chipped tooth.
"Xavier," Chidi's voice was a deep bass that seemed to vibrate the glass. "You look too clean, my brother. The air in this city must be made of perfume and money."
Xavier stepped forward, and the two men locked arms in a traditional greeting that was part hug and part test of strength. "It's good to see you, Chidi. I wish it were under better circumstances."
Chidi's smile faded as he looked past Xavier at Seraphina. He gave a respectful nod, his eyes briefly flicking to the diamond on her finger. "The Queen. We heard the stories. You've turned our lion into a husband."
"And he's turned our empire into a battlefield," Seraphina replied, stepping forward with her hand extended. She didn't flinch under Chidi's intense gaze. "Thank you for coming. My husband speaks of you with a respect he gives to few."
"We owe him our lives, Madam," Chidi said, shaking her hand firmly but gently. "In Lagos, a man's word is his blood. Xavier gave us his word, and we give him our steel."
They moved to the waiting SUVs, the atmosphere in the car thick with the weight of the mission ahead. Efe was already opening a rugged laptop, his fingers flying across the keys as he bypassed the airport's local network.
"The Syndicate's mark," Efe said, showing a screen filled with scrolling red code. "It's not just an organization, Xavier. It's a parasite. They've already started pinging the Vane Global servers. They aren't waiting for the forty-eight hours. They're testing the walls right now."
Xavier's jaw set. "Can you block them?"
"For now," Efe replied. "But they have more processing power than a small nation. We need to find their local hub. They have to be operating out of somewhere within the city to have this kind of low-latency access to your systems."
Seraphina leaned in, her eyes sharp. "The old shipping docks. My grandfather once mentioned a series of underground bunkers built during the war that were never officially decommissioned. If the Syndicate is working with Silas's old contacts, that's where they'd hide."
Xavier looked at his crew—the Old Guard—and then at his wife. The worlds of Lagos and the Vane Empire had finally collided.
"Tonight, we don't just defend the Vane Tower," Xavier declared. "Tonight, we hunt. Chidi, get the gear ready. Zane, I want eyes on every exit of those docks. Efe, I want a blackout on the Syndicate's comms the moment we move in."
As the SUVs sped toward the Vane mansion, Xavier felt a sense of completion. He had the power of an empire and the loyalty of the streets. The Syndicate thought they were coming for a payday, but they were about to find out that when you threaten a lion's home, you don't get a negotiation. You get a war.