Chapter 24
24
ATLAS
T he storm wasn’t natural.
I knew it from the first rumble that cracked the sky wide open, a low growl like a beast waking in the dark. Charleston weather could turn fast—heat thick as honey, air charged with old ghosts—but this … this was different.
The wind slapped against the shack’s rusted tin roof in angry bursts, and the rain came sideways. It hissed against the cracked windows like it wanted inside.
I sat on an old wooden stool, satellite phone cradled to my ear, the antenna flicking with static. The reception here was cleaner than anything inside Dominion Hall, which was exactly why I came here when I needed to vanish.
The shack wasn’t much—one room, four walls, a cot I never used. No one knew about it. Not even my brothers.
Which made it perfect for hunting shadows.
The first call went to a man known only as Crow. Former CIA asset turned fixer. If anyone in Charleston had eyes in the cracks, it was him.
He didn’t pick up.
The second was to Marta, an archivist-turned-information broker who worked out of an auto repair shop downtown. She always answered—unless she was already in trouble.
The line clicked twice. No voice.
I listened to the breath on the other end, slow and measured.
“Marta,” I said.
“Atlas.” Her voice was brittle, like she was chewing glass. “You shouldn’t be calling me.”
“Then you shouldn’t be ignoring me.”
A beat of silence.
“You’re not the only one looking into Dominion Hall,” she said. “And not all of them ask nicely.”
Department 77.
Their fingerprints were everywhere lately, pressed deep into the bones of Charleston. Whispers of reactivations, missing men, sealed court records no one could trace. Like the whole city was being prepped for something dark.
“You know who they are?” I asked.
She hesitated.
“I know who’s asking about you. About Anna Peters. About your father’s records.”
The old rage surged through me like napalm.
They were getting closer.
“You owe me,” I said, quiet but cutting.
“I’m not arguing.” She exhaled. “Check with Neidermeyer.”
Kyle Neidermeyer. The drug runner who liked to play both sides of the law, depending on how much money was in it for him.
“He calls himself Joey now.”
“I know what he calls himself. Tell him I’m coming, and to stay put.” I said, and hung up.
I stood slowly, every joint tight, my blood already pounding.
Neidermeyer wasn’t smart, but he was slippery. And if he was running product to Charleston’s elite, odds were good he’d overheard something he shouldn’t have.
Something about Anna.
I pulled on my jacket, shoved the phone in my pocket, and opened the shack’s door.
The storm swallowed me whole.
* * *
Joey— Kyle —lived in the kind of neighborhood that made you question your grip on reality. Perfect lawns, American flags on porches, windchimes tinkling like a lullaby. Every house painted soft pastel, like a fucking Norman Rockwell fever dream.
But it was all a lie.
The swing set in Joey’s backyard was slick with rain, plastic frogs on the seats. No kids ever played there. Just props for a man who needed to disappear.
I stepped up to the door, the porch light flickering above me. Knocked once.
Nothing.
I waited three seconds. Knocked again—harder.
Still nothing.
I knew he was in there. I could feel him behind the door, probably crouched low, watching the shadow of my boots through the frosted glass.
I rapped the metal handle of my lighter against the doorframe. Loud. Deliberate.
The lock clicked. Just a hair.
Then Joey’s greasy voice floated through the crack. “You got the money?”
My response was simple.
I kicked the door.
The wood split with a loud crack and the entire frame gave way like it was made of matchsticks. The door slammed back into the wall, and I stepped inside like a storm.
Joey was scrambling. He hadn’t even made it to the hall when I caught him by the front of his hoodie and slammed him into the nearest wall.
“Jesus—fuck! Atlas, man, wait?—”
“You get paid,” I growled, pressing an elbow into his chest, “ after you puke your guts out.”
His eyes bulged, feet kicking as I pressed harder. He smelled like sweat, weed, and that expensive cologne drug dealers used to pretend they belonged in the room.
“I didn’t do anything!” he gasped.
I leaned in. “You saw Eugene Tiddle talking to someone. Tell me everything.”
“I—I didn’t—okay, okay!” He clawed at my forearm, wild-eyed. “It was yesterday, I swear. I was making a drop. Just coke. One of my regulars.”
I shoved him harder against the wall. “Where?”
“South of Broad. Big house. Private gathering, one of those ‘gentlemen’s’ things. Invite-only.”
“And Tiddle?”
“He was there. Talking to two other guys. All in suits, fancy watches, the whole old-money vibe. I wasn’t supposed to be near them. But the guy I was selling to, he wanted his fix now. Made me come into the drawing room to hand it off.”
Joey’s voice was shaking now, his breath shallow. I let him down half an inch, just enough for blood to get to his brain.
“What did you hear?”
He swallowed. “They were talking about a girl. Some Anna chick. Said she was … a wildcard. That she’d been seen with someone from the Hall. ”
His eyes darted to mine, terrified.
“You were the someone, weren’t you?” he dared to ask.
I didn’t answer.
Joey kept going. “They weren’t happy. They were saying she was being watched. That if she got too close to any of the Danes, it would complicate the schedule.”
“What schedule?”
“I don’t know! I swear! But they were nervous. One of them said something like, ‘she can’t be trusted—she’s Petrov’s daughter.’ That spooked the others.”
My blood turned to ice.
They knew.
They knew who she was.
“Who were the men?” I snapped.
Joey winced. “I don’t know. I only recognized the guy I was selling to.”
“Name.”
“Leonard Pennington. Real estate, I think. Always pays cash. Good customer.”
I stared down at him, the storm outside roaring louder.
He was telling the truth. I could hear it in the cadence of his breath. The nervousness was real.
I let him drop to the ground.
He crumpled, gasping, hands shaking.
“Pennington,” I said. “Give me the address.”
Joey rattled it off like his life depended on it.
It kind of did.
I turned toward the busted door, pulling it closed behind me best I could.
Joey scrambled to sit up, voice warbling. “Wait—what about payment?”
I turned slowly.
“Payment?”
He flinched. “I—I gave you everything I had, man?—”
I smiled.
Then swung.
The haymaker connected clean against his jaw, sending him sprawling onto the hardwood like a sack of bricks. His head bounced once. He didn’t move.
I stood over him, breathing heavy, thunder cracking above us like judgment.
“If you tell anyone I was here,” I said quietly, “I’ll come back and kill you.”
I knelt, close enough to see the flicker of life still behind his eyelids.
“ Slowly. ”
Then I was gone.
* * *
I drove with the storm in my rearview mirror, the tires slicing through shallow rivers on the road. Charleston blurred past, all cobblestone and colonial charm. I didn’t see it. Couldn’t.
All I saw was Anna.
Anna, in the garden. Anna, with my name on her lips. Anna, pinned between me and stone, giving me everything.
And now—this.
They were watching her. Planning around her. Whispering about her father like he was a player in a game no one else could see.
Alexey Petrov.
I should’ve seen the name for what it was. Not just academic royalty. Not just the mind behind MIT’s neural engineering.
But a key.
A link.
To them.
To Department 77.
If they were watching Anna, it wasn’t just because she’d crossed paths with me.
It was because she was something bigger .
And now Leonard Pennington was going to tell me why.
Or he was going to bleed.