Chapter 7: Shadows on Dock Street
The industrial district smelled of stagnant river water and diesel exhaust. Marcus’s battered gray sedan crept along the perimeter of the Dock Street storage facility without turning on its headlights, blending seamlessly into the rusted rows of corrugated metal buildings. A chain-link fence topped with coils of razor wire cut off the property from the municipal slip, where dark water lapped lazily against concrete pilings.
I checked the digital feed on my burner phone. The warehouse security system was tied into Vane Enterprises' private network—a network that had been partially crippled by the data dump I initiated forty-eight hours ago. Half their remote cameras were throwing error codes, cycling through frozen frames of empty corridors.
"You stay in the car," Marcus muttered, killing the engine. "If those private guards come out, I’m an old man lost looking for the bait shop down the road."
"No," I said, unlatching my door with a soft click. "The entry code uses an algorithm Preston’s father set up using an old family birthdate. Marcus, you don't know which sequence triggers the silent alarm. I do."
I slipped out into the damp chill, wearing a dark canvas jacket and heavy work boots. The mud squelched quietly beneath my soles as I moved toward the side service door of Unit 402. My heart hammered against my ribs, a familiar, terrifying rhythm I had spent years trying to quiet. Every instinct screamed at me to turn back, to hide in the safety of Mrs. Gable’s farmhouse with Lily. But running meant leaving behind the one immutable piece of physical truth that could tear down Preston’s fabricated life.
The keypad glowed a pale, sickly green in the gloom. My fingers hovered over the plastic buttons. I closed my eyes, visualizing the night Preston first brought me to this very storage unit to stash boxes of smuggled corporate ledgers. Seven, four, two, nine.
The red light flickered, turned solid green, and the heavy steel door unlatched with a dull, pneumatic hiss.
I slipped inside, the air instantly tasting of dust, aged oak, and dry-rot. The beam of my pocket flashlight cut through the gloom, tracking across stacked crates of obsolete office furniture, rolled-up Persian rugs, and spare display stands from a dozen charity galas. And there, propped against a stack of empty wine crates in the far corner, was the solid oak wedding menu board.
The gold calligraphy gleamed dully under a patina of dust. Near the bottom corner, the dark, jagged stain of Lily’s blood—splattered when Preston swung the heavy wood down with malicious force—remained unmistakably etched into the grain.
As I reached out my hand to touch the wood, a blinding beam of light cut across the darkness from behind me.
May you like
"Don't move," a low, gravelly voice barked from the doorway.
Heavy footsteps crunched on the concrete floor. I spun around, my breath catching in my throat as a hulking figure in a dark security uniform stepped out of the shadows, his hand resting heavily on the grip of a heavy-duty taser at his belt.
