Chapter Four #2
It was Bryce’s voice, cold and deliberate, slicing through the static like a knife.
A red alert buried in calm tones, but it set every nerve in my body on fire.
Bryce promised Trent guardianship of his youngest—Kimber.
Guardianship. The word itself was poison, bile rising in my throat just hearing it.
Kimber wasn’t a ward to be protected or a daughter to be cherished in their eyes.
She was a bargaining chip. A possession.
A prize being transferred from one set of filthy hands to another.
The part that makes me sick? It wasn’t random.
Bryce didn’t hand out power without reason.
He said it was because Trent had a big job coming up, something significant enough to warrant such a “reward.” But he never slipped into the conversation about what that job was.
Not one detail. And that silence was louder than any answer could’ve been.
Whatever they’re planning, whatever’s waiting on the horizon, it’s big. Dangerous.
My rage nearly cost me everything in that moment.
My hands shook hard enough that I almost crushed the recorder, vision bleeding red as every instinct in me screamed to end him—right then and there.
To drag him into the street and carve the truth out of him before the exchange could ever happen.
Because there’s only one reason men like Trent Malloy want guardianship over a girl Kimber’s age, and it has nothing to do with keeping her safe.
The recording didn’t just confirm my suspicions—it etched them in stone.
Drew a line I can never cross back over.
Trent thinks he’s untouchable because he’s useful, because he’s loyal, because he knows too many of Bryce’s secrets.
But tonight, usefulness won’t save him. Tonight, I stop him from circling.
Tonight, I make sure Kimber never ends up in his hands.
One of the smartest things I ever did was learn how to crack databases.
It turned bureaucracy into a weapon—custody paperwork rerouted, approvals fast-tracked, every safeguard sealed tight with no loopholes left for them to claw back.
Once the wheels started turning, the police would have no choice but to follow through, no matter how loud Bryce screamed.
Kimber is already being pulled from that house—papers filed; custody transferred to Emerson where it belongs.
It almost felt too easy, like sliding a blade through warm butter.
No blood, no noise. Just signatures, timestamps, and systems bending the way they were supposed to.
For once, the law worked in our favor. Kimber will be safe now—or at least safer than she’s ever been. That part was simple.
The hard part—the fun part—comes tonight.
Tonight, when I finally get to carve Trent Malloy’s name off the board and etch another tally into the war I’m waging.
One more cut. One more body. Another hotdog octopus for the pile, another “untouchable” reduced to meat.
I almost laugh at the image, because the thought of collecting them like twisted trophies is the only way to keep from drowning in the rage that fuels me.
Before long, I’ll have an entire consortium.
A council of the dead. Men who thought they were kings, laid low at my feet like nothing more than butchered scraps.
It’s taken weeks to set this in motion. Weeks of watching, waiting, tracking his patterns and movements, piecing together a puzzle that never seemed to want to fit cleanly.
The wiretap gave me enough to know Bryce promised him something monumental—a “big job,” significant enough to warrant the promise of Kimber as some disgusting prize.
But that’s all they gave me. No details.
No timeline. Just silence that gnawed at me every second since, leaving me guessing, pacing, planning without knowing when he’d make his move.
And that uncertainty is the sharpest blade of all.
For all I know, he could’ve already done it.
Whatever this job was, it could be finished, and Kimber simply hasn’t swapped hands yet.
That thought coils in my gut, cold and venomous, because it means I’m already behind.
I hate being behind. It means I’m reacting instead of controlling, clawing instead of cutting clean.
But tonight, that changes. Tonight, Trent Malloy’s time runs out, whether he’s finished Bryce’s job or not. Because the second he thought Kimber’s life could be bartered like currency, he wrote his own ending, and I’m the one holding the pen.
~~~~~
The docks reek of salt and rot, that sickly cocktail of dead fish, oil, and mildew that never fades, no matter how many tides roll through.
It’s a smell that seeps into your clothes, clings to your hair, and follows you home like a curse.
The night air is sharp, cold enough to bite at my lungs with every inhale, heavy enough to press down like a weight across my chest. The shadows here are thick, layered, and broken only by the flicker of a dying floodlight that throws fractured beams across the wet pavement. Perfect cover. Perfect stage.
I crouch behind a stack of crates, fingers tight on the hilt of my blade, waiting.
Patience hums through me, but underneath it thrums anticipation, a predator’s focus honed razor-sharp.
My heartbeat is steady, my breathing controlled.
This is where I belong—in the dark, in the silence before the kill.
Vince Toller finally stumbles out of the warehouse, his boots dragging lazily across the concrete, leaving faint wet streaks behind him.
He reeks of sweat and cheap liquor, but his grin shines bright and smug in the dim light, his bloodshot eyes flicking greedily to the wad of cash in his hands.
He fans the bills like they’re a trophy, smirking to himself as though he’s king of the docks, the untouchable rat fattening himself on scraps no one will miss.
He thinks the stink of the ocean hides the stink of his sins, but I smell it.
I see it. Every crime clings to him like grime under his fingernails.
He doesn’t notice me sliding from the shadows, my steps as quiet as the tide rolling beneath the dock.
He doesn’t hear the soft whisper of my blade freeing itself, steel catching faint light like a promise.
His head bows, his lips moving silently as he adds zero after zero to the cash in his head.
Whiskey. Drugs. Girls too young to know better.
He’s already spent it all before the night’s over.
I let him walk, let him wander closer to the water, where the waves slap lazily at the pylons, where the noise of the surf will swallow his cries.
My foot kicks a loose chain lying abandoned on the ground.
The sharp metallic clatter shatters the stillness, ricocheting down the dock.
Vince’s head jerks up, confusion flashing across his face as he turns toward the sound.
That’s when I move.
I’m on him before he can think, my hand clamping over his mouth, cutting off his startled grunt, shoving him back against the wall of rusted steel siding.
The impact rattles his teeth, the sound a dull thud against the hollow metal.
My blade slides under his chin, cold and sharp, kissing the tender flesh of his throat.
His body stiffens, eyes flying wide, red-rimmed and desperate.
He trembles, breath wheezing hot against my palm.
I lean in close, so close that my breath ghosts across his ear, so close he can smell the iron tang of steel mixed with the salt of the sea. My voice is low, deliberate, a whisper sharpened into a blade. “I know what you’ve done, Vince.”
His pupils dilate, panic swallowing the arrogance. And for the first time tonight, he realizes he’s not untouchable. He’s prey.
“You like to skim shipments, huh, Vince?” My whisper slithers into his ear, low and venomous, a blade of its own.
“Think nobody notices when you take what isn’t yours?
” My knife presses harder beneath his chin, just enough to part the skin.
A bead of crimson wells up and trails down his throat, catching in the hollow of his collarbone.
He whimpers, the sound muffled against my palm, shaking his head in frantic denial, as though flailing lies will undo the truth carved into him.
“But that’s not even your worst sin, is it?
” I hiss, my voice tightening with every word, each one slicing deeper than steel.
“No, Vince. You thought no one kept track of the kids you traded like currency. The girls you promised work at the docks—told them you’d give them a chance—and then sold them off when they couldn’t pay you back.
You thought the sound of the ocean drowned their screams, that their families would never know why they vanished.
” My lip curls, rage flooding every syllable.
“And what about the boy? The one who ran. The one you tossed into the water like trash, just to prove a point. You stood there and watched him thrash until the tide swallowed him whole. Thought nobody saw, didn’t you? ”
His eyes bulge, sweat dripping down his temples as the truth rattles through him harder than my grip.
All while his legs kick weakly, the fight draining from him, replaced with the blind panic of a man realizing his sins aren’t secrets anymore.
His boots scrape against the splintered wood of the dock as I drag him forward, every step punctuated by the screech of rubber against wet planks.
The sound echoes in the night, a fitting dirge.