CHAPTER 14
RAFE
The truth would be easier if it were smaller.
Nora stands in her bedroom holding the evidence sleeve between us. The apartment contains two cameras, a compromised computer, and enough signs of intrusion to justify leaving immediately.
She wants an accounting of me.
That is reasonable.
I dislike it anyway.
“The first time was to install the camera,” I say.
Her face remains still.
“The second?”
“To repair the lock after someone tested the door.”
“You arranged the building repair.”
“Yes.”
“You entered before the contractor.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To confirm nothing had been placed inside.”
“The third?”
“A man followed you from the train. I searched the apartment before you came home.”
“Colin?”
“No. Different man. Hired surveillance.”
“By whom?”
“I did not identify him then.”
“What happened to him?”
“He left Chicago.”
Her eyes narrow. “Voluntarily?”
“Eventually.”
“That word is doing a lot of work.”
“Yes.”
She waits for the fourth entry.
This one has no clean operational explanation.
“The night you were ill,” I say.
The evidence sleeve moves slightly in her hand.
“What illness?”
“Fever. Three weeks ago.”
Memory reaches her.
“I had food poisoning.”
“You had a temperature of one hundred three.”
“How do you know the number?”
“I checked.”
The room becomes quieter.
“You entered while I was asleep.”
“Yes.”
“What did you do?”
“Removed the camera. Changed the water beside your bed. Replaced expired medication.”
Her gaze shifts toward the nightstand.
The water glass from that night is gone, but the bottle of fever reducer remains in the drawer. I replaced it with a new one after noticing the original expiration date through the camera.
“You touched me.”
“Your forehead and wrist.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
The answer comes immediately.
Her eyes remain on mine.
“I stayed in the chair by the door until your temperature dropped,” I continue. “I did not enter the bed. I did not remove clothing. I did not photograph you.”
“Did you watch me sleep?”
“Yes.”
The word hurts her.
There is no way to change that without lying.
“Why didn’t you call a doctor?”
“You refused one when Mina suggested it.”
“You heard that conversation.”
“Yes.”
“You decided my refusal applied to you.”
“I decided a doctor arriving at midnight would create a record and expose the surveillance around you.”
“So you chose yourself.”
“Yes.”
Nora looks down at the sleeve.
Her hair falls forward, concealing part of her face. She has changed into dark jeans and the green coat she approved yesterday. There is a faint bruise along her jaw from the street attack and another beneath the collar where I struck her away from the sedan.
I put those marks on her while saving her life.
The sentence does not improve the marks.
“What else did you do that night?” she asks.
“Nothing.”
“You moved the vase.”
“Yes.”
“You changed the water.”
“Yes.”
“You left medicine.”
“Yes.”
“You watched until morning.”
“Until five seventeen.”
Her mouth tightens at the precision.
I should not have given the minute.
I often understand the error after speaking, never before.
Nora places the memory card inside her bag.
“You will give me every record you kept about this apartment.”
“Yes.”
“Not a selection.”
“All of it.”
“If I find out later that you hid something—”
“You will not.”
“You said that as though the issue is whether I catch you.”
I look at the second camera.
“The issue is that each omission increases the damage when you learn it.”
She becomes very still.
I have said something she did not expect me to understand.
I did not expect it either.
“Where did you learn that?” she asks.
“From you.”
The answer remains between us.
Nora moves toward the living room.
I follow after checking the hall.
The second camera transmits through a private wireless network created inside the building’s utility system. The signal is weak but active. We can identify the receiving point if it remains close.
Nora watches as I connect the detector.
“No technical lecture,” she says.
“The camera sends to a device within approximately half a mile.”
“That is enough.”
I move through the apartment.
The signal strengthens near the front windows, then weakens toward the bedroom. Whoever receives it is likely east or southeast.
Nico waits downstairs with the vehicle.
I contact him.
“Drive the surrounding blocks. Search for a stationary receiver using Aurelia security equipment.”
Nora hears the instruction.
“Could Mercer have it in his car?”
“Yes.”
“Then the camera may lead us to him.”
“Yes.”
“We follow. We do not attack until we know where he takes the data.”
I look at her.
She raises one eyebrow.
“Joint decision.”
The words are mine now because she made them necessary.
“Agreed,” I say.
We remove the memory card from the second camera but leave the transmission unit active, replacing the lens with a looped image from before our arrival. Anyone watching will see an empty apartment.
Nora recognizes the old image immediately.
“That blanket is from last week.”
“Yes.”
“You can tell?”
“I was watching.”
Her expression closes.
Another mistake.
“I remember the room,” I correct.
“That is not better.”
“No.”
Nico calls twelve minutes later.
“Signal is moving.”
“Direction?”
“South on Clark. Black utility van.”
“Distance?”
“Three blocks.”
We leave through the service stairs.
Nora walks without limping now, but she moves carefully when descending. Her ribs remain painful. She hides both facts because she does not want them used to exclude her.
I open the rear door of Nico’s sedan.
She takes the passenger seat instead.
I drive.
The receiver van maintains an ordinary speed. Nico follows in another vehicle two blocks back. We remain far enough behind that the van’s driver will see only traffic.
Nora studies the map.
“If he knows the apartment is empty, where would he take the recording?”
“Secure storage. A handler. A disposal site.”
“Which one requires the equipment?”
“Storage or transfer.”
“Then he may be collecting from other cameras.”
The thought aligns with the route.
The van stops twice near buildings connected to Aurelia contractors. At each location, the signal changes strength before continuing.
“A network,” Nora says. “Not just me.”
“Possibly.”
“Employees?”
“Witnesses. Rivals. Family.”
She turns toward me. “How much surveillance exists inside your organization?”
“Too much.”
“That is not a number.”
“There is no number I trust.”
The van leaves the residential area and moves toward a warehouse district near the river.
Nico’s voice enters through the car system. “Two vehicles at the destination. Six men visible.”
“Hold position.”
Nora looks at me. “You said no attack.”
“I said hold.”
“Your tone has subcategories.”
“Yes.”
The van enters a fenced property.
A sign identifies the building as a document storage company that closed two years ago.
The front gate remains open.
“Is it Bellandi property?” Nora asks.
“No.”
“Tommaso?”
“Not publicly.”
“Then we observe.”
I park behind an abandoned loading dock with a view of the entrance.
Nico positions elsewhere.
For fifteen minutes, men unload cases from the utility van. One resembles Dean Mercer, though the distance and hood obscure his face. Another wears Aurelia security clothing.
Nora photographs the license plates.
A white panel truck leaves the property without cases.
“Decoy,” she says.
“Likely.”
“Which vehicle carries the data?”
“None yet.”
“How do you know?”
“The man in the gray coat has remained near the loading door. He is waiting for authorization.”
She examines him through the camera zoom.
“Tommaso?”
“No.”
“Someone from his office?”
“Elliot Crane. Operations manager.”
“Can he access security stock?”
“Yes.”
Crane takes out a phone.
Seconds later, the loading door rises fully.
A third vehicle reverses inside.
No plates.
Nora lowers the camera. “That one.”
“Yes.”
The building lights flicker.
Something is wrong.
The men near the entrance stop moving at the same time.
A coordinated pause.
“They know,” I say.
“How?”
I look at the detector.
The camera signal has stopped.
Someone discovered the loop.
“Down.”
I pull Nora below the dashboard as the first explosion breaks through the warehouse windows.
Heat and pressure strike the car.
The windshield cracks inward.
The sound swallows everything.
A second detonation follows near the loading bay. Metal tears from the building and crosses the lot.
I cover Nora’s head with my arms.
The sedan rocks on its suspension.
Nico shouts through the speaker, but the words arrive distorted.
Smoke rises beyond the dashboard.
Nora moves beneath me.
“I’m okay.”
I do not release her.
“Rafe.”
Another vehicle catches fire near the gate.
Men run from the side entrance.
Some are burning.
I force myself away from Nora long enough to assess her.
No visible blood. Pupils responsive. Glass in her hair, not skin.
“Are you hurt?”
“My ears.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
She grips my wrist.
Blood covers her fingers.
Not hers.
Mine.
A shard of glass has cut through my sleeve near the left shoulder. The pain reaches me only after I see it.
Nora looks toward the warehouse.
“We need to help them.”
“Secondary devices may remain.”
“They’re on fire.”
“Nora.”
She opens the passenger door.
I catch her coat.
Her face turns toward me with fury already formed.
I release the fabric.
“Stay behind the concrete barrier,” I say. “Do not enter the structure.”
She nods once.
We move.
The first injured man collapses near the fence. Nora reaches him before I do, removes her coat, and uses it to smother the flames on his back.
I drag another man behind the barrier.
Nico arrives from the opposite side with a fire extinguisher.
Sirens begin in the distance.
Crane emerges from the smoke holding one arm against his chest. When he sees me, he turns toward a parked motorcycle.
I move after him.
My injured shoulder protests.
Nora catches my sleeve.
“No.”
“He knows who ordered this.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“He is leaving.”
“So are we.”
Crane reaches the motorcycle.
The fuel tank ignites before he can mount.
The blast throws him backward.
He does not rise.
Nora’s grip tightens around my sleeve.
The warehouse roof begins to collapse.
We retreat to the sedan.
Nico takes the wheel because my left arm no longer moves cleanly.
Nora sits beside me in the back.
She presses a folded strip of cloth against the wound. Her green coat remains on the injured man near the barrier. She wears only the black sweater beneath it, dusted with ash.
The building burns behind us.
“What was stored there?” she asks.
“Whatever Tommaso could not allow us to find.”
“You still think it was Tommaso.”
“Yes.”
“Crane may have been destroying evidence for someone else.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
“Crane reported directly to Tommaso.”
She presses harder against the wound.
Pain sharpens my vision.
“Nora.”
“You’re bleeding through it.”
“The cut is not deep.”
“You cannot see it.”
“I felt the glass.”
“That is not a medical assessment.”
The phrase is mine from the safehouse.
She knows it.
Our eyes meet.
A strange silence passes between us, made of remembered blood, unfinished bandages, and the fact that she is close enough for me to feel the tremor in her hands.
Then the road tilts.
The sound in the car becomes distant.
Nora says my name.
I try to answer.
Darkness reaches me first.