The digital clock on the dashboard of the rented sedan glowed a harsh, luminescent green: 11:15 PM.
The rain had stopped, leaving the city streets slick and mirror-black under the amber glare of sodium-vapor streetlights. I parked the car three blocks away from the north pier, cutting the engine and extinguishing the headlights. The harbor air smelled of dead seaweed, diesel exhaust, and salt. Looming ahead of us in the darkness was the skeletal iron framework of the abandoned grain elevator, its rusted conveyors stretching out over the dark, choppy water of the bay like the ribs of some ancient leviathan.
"Stay in the footwell under the wool blanket," I whispered, looking back at Leo, who was curled into a tight ball on the floorboards behind the front passenger seat. "If anyone opens this door who isn't me, you press the lock button on the driver's side and you run toward the freight yards. Do you understand?"
"I'm coming with you, Eleanor," Leo said, his voice hard with a stubbornness that was terrifyingly familiar—it was the exact tone I had used a thousand times in mirror-practice before standing up to Julian at board meetings. "You left me once because you didn't know I was alive. I'm not letting you walk into the dark alone this time."
Before I could argue, the passenger-side door was wrenched open with a sharp, metallic screech.
May you like
A heavy, gloved hand clamped around my wrist before I could reach for the door handle. The streetlamp behind the vehicle cast a long, distorted shadow across the pavement, revealing the broad, tailored shoulders of Marcus, Julian's head of security. His face was a mask of placid, corporate indifference, the kind of man who would sever a fiber-optic cable or break a femur with the exact same professional detachment he used to balance a ledger.
"Mr. Vance is waiting on the pier, Mrs. Vance," Marcus said, his voice flat and devoid of human warmth. "And he prefers his family gatherings to start on time."
