Chapter 38 - Shadows in the Morning
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I didn't tell Amy. I broke my promise of an honest foundation before the ink on our new life was even dry. I waited until she was fast asleep, the soft rhythm of her breathing the only sound in the bedroom, and I slipped out of bed. I pulled on dark jeans, a heavy hoodie, and retrieved the locked steel lockbox from the back of the closet. I hadn't touched the firearm inside for over fourteen months. It felt heavy and foreign in my hand.
Julian was waiting in his car three blocks down the street, engine idling silently in the freezing night. I slipped into the passenger seat, the ambient green light from the dashboard illuminating the grim resolve on his face.
"Radio silence from here on out," Julian said, shifting the car into drive.
We drove to the abandoned industrial railyard on the edge of the city. The area was a graveyard of rusted metal, shattered glass, and forgotten ambitions. We parked a quarter-mile away and approached on foot, our boots crunching softly on the frost-covered gravel.
At exactly midnight, we stood in the shadow of a decaying warehouse. There was no one here. No headlights, no footsteps. Just the biting wind howling through the hollow steel structures.
"It's a setup," Julian whispered, his hand resting on the grip of his weapon.
My burner phone vibrated again. The harsh buzz made me jump. I pulled it out and read the new message.
Look up.
I tilted my head back. Suspended from a rusted crane boom fifty feet above us, illuminated by a single, harsh spotlight that suddenly snapped on, was a man. He was bound, beaten, and hanging by his wrists.
"My god," Julian breathed. "That's Marcus."
Marcus was the federal prosecutor who had sealed our immunity deal. He was the one man who had guaranteed our safety. And now, he was dangling like a piece of meat.
Before we could even process the horror of the scene, the spotlight clicked off, plunging us back into absolute darkness.
A distorted voice echoed from a hidden loudspeaker mounted somewhere in the rafters.
May you like
"You kept secrets, David," the voice boomed, metallic and cold. "And secrets have a very high interest rate. Bring me the Zurich Ledger by tomorrow night, or the federal protection you enjoy will be revoked. Permanently."
We ran. We didn't wait to see if there were snipers in the dark. We ran back to the car, the terrifying reality setting in: the storm hadn't passed. It had just been waiting in the eye.
