Chapter 20 #3
Jersey threw him a middle finger.
Miami smirked.
Quinn smacked his shoulder lightly. “Focus on the screens, idiot.”
He winked at her and disappeared into the camera room.
Snake Eyes and Spade were already at the door, helmets in hand. Turnpike rolled his shoulders, his new patch catching the light when he moved. Priest checked something in his med kit and snapped it closed.
We moved.
Outside, the air hit cool and salty. The yard lights threw harsh white circles across the concrete. Bikes sat lined up like war horses, chrome dull under the weight of everything riding them.
We swung our legs over in a practiced chorus. Engines rolled over, coughing to life one after another.
I slid my helmet on, visor up for now, the world going slightly muffled as the padding closed around my ears.
Jersey’s bike moved to the front. Mine drifted up beside his until our knees almost brushed.
He glanced over, visor still up too. His eyes met mine through the dim yard light.
“Safe space,” he said quietly, just for me.
It landed somewhere under my ribs and stayed there.
“Then don’t get it shot up,” I replied.
He huffed a breath that might’ve accompanied a smile.
The gate groaned open in front of us. The strip glittered faint in the distance, a jagged line of electric promise over darker streets.
We then rolled out.
***
Atlantic City always looked better at night from a distance.
Up close, you could smell the rot. Salt and spilled beer and piss in alleyways. Old grease. Old money. Old dreams. Tonight, it also smelled like something electric was waiting.
We took back streets until we hit the boards. The bikes dropped to a slower, more controlled rumble as we rolled up the ramp, engines echoing off the buildings on either side. Lights from the casinos hit us in waves—neon, LEDs, animated screens shouting at anyone with a wallet and a death wish.
The boardwalk itself was quieter on this stretch.
Off-season. Weeknight. The closer we got to the far end, the less foot traffic there was.
A few couples out walking. A drunk or two weaving along.
A small knot of kids in hoodies who stopped talking when we passed and watched us with that mix of awe and wariness.
Ahead, Roman’s new build rose up out of the boards like somebody had planted a glass and concrete tree and told it to hurry.
Glass curtain walls caught the neon from its distant neighbors, throwing back fractured colors.
The lower levels were wrapped in temporary fencing and branded banners showing smooth digital renderings of what it would be when it was done—smiling couples at roulette tables, families by a rooftop pool, some actress pretending she ate burgers at three in the morning.
Above that, floors stacked up into the dark, some lit, some not. The structure’s edges were sharp enough to cut the sky.
We rolled to a stop a half-block from the boardwalk entrance.
The construction site was supposed to be alive even this late. Crews finishing their shifts. Security guards leaning in doorways. Delivery trucks coming and going. There should’ve been noise. Light. Life.
There wasn’t.
The gate on the boardwalk side stood half-open, metal chain looped through but not actually locked. A plastic “SITE CLOSED” sign hung crooked, the corners flapping idly in the breeze coming off the ocean.
There was no guard at the little glass security booth to the left. The chair inside sat empty. A coffee cup lay on its side on the counter, slowly dripping onto a stack of paperwork. The monitors on the wall behind it showed static and blue screens.
“Miami,” Jersey said into his mic. “Talk to me.”
There was a crackle, then Miami’s voice came through our earpieces, low and threaded with static.
“You’re pretty clear on the boardwalk side,” he said. “I’ve got street cams.”
A minute of silence, then Miami again. “Roman’s guy just pushed the feed through,” he said. “I’m seeing… main lobby cams offline. That security booth you’re near is dark on my end too. Everything else seems disabled.”
“So, you don’t see anybody?” I asked.
“Wait, I’ve got movement on… no,” Miami said. “That’s a loop. They’re running a loop on one of the other cameras. Time stamp’s an hour off. Somebody rerouted it to cover whatever they just did.”
“Of course they did,” Spade muttered.
“I’m not seeing any active bodies on the boardwalk entrance right now,” Miami went on. “Nothing obvious at least. Street side, there’s a van parked two blocks back from the main delivery gate. Could be something. Could be theirs. Hard to tell. Windows are tinted. Nobody’s getting out.”
“Roman’s men?” Turnpike asked.
“If they are, they’re sitting still,” Miami said. “And off comms like he said. No movement. No smoking. No heads popping out for air. Just an SUV that looks like it should be somewhere else.”
The ocean roared steadily behind us. Gulls cried overhead. Somewhere down the line, a casino playlist switched tracks, the bass thump changing tempo.
Jersey looked at me.
“Feels wrong,” he said softly.
“It is wrong,” I replied. “Let’s go see how wrong.”
We dismounted, boots hitting boardwalk planks in near unison.
Guns were drawn but held low. Cuts closed. Helmets left on bikes.
Snake Eyes took point to the gate, nudged the loose chain aside with his boot, and pushed it open further. It squealed on its hinges, as loud as a scream in the relative quiet.
Inside the fenced zone, the ground shifted from weathered wood to packed dirt and poured concrete. Temporary work lights on stands threw uneven yellow pools across stacks of materials—pallets of drywall, bundles of rebar, wrapped bathroom fixtures still in cardboard.
The main boardwalk entrance was a set of wide glass double doors framed in temporary metal barricades that had been pulled aside. One of the doors sat slightly ajar.
My hand went to my pocket automatically, fingers brushing the shape of my phone. Liberty’s name sat just under my thumb in the contact list.
I thumbed it open, tapped out a quick message with my free hand as we moved.
I hit send.
The tiny “delivered” popped up almost instantly under the text.
I watched. One heartbeat. Two. Three.
No “read,” receipt.
Liberty almost always opened my messages within seconds. Even if she didn’t answer right away, that little word would show up. It was a stupid detail to cling to in the middle of somebody else’s family crisis, but it snagged sharp in my ribs anyway.
Maybe she was in the shower. Maybe she had her hands in engine grease. Maybe she was halfway through yelling at someone about something.
Maybe.
I slid the phone back into my pocket and met Jersey’s gaze.
He’d been watching me again. He saw something in my face that made his own harden.
Jersey then glanced up at the face of the building. Dark windows stared back. A few glowed faintly up top, emergency lights or half-finished systems running tests perhaps.
“Miami?” he said.
“Nothing at the entrance,” Miami answered. “No heat signatures near ground level on Roman’s thermal either. Whatever happened, it’s not happening right where you are. Or it’s already finished.”
I pushed down the instinct to look over my shoulder. The boardwalk behind us felt too open now. Too exposed. People were still walking past, giving us a wide berth, eyes flicking between our patches and the half-built hotel.
“Tell us everything,” Blackjack’s voice came across the channel in my ear, rougher with distance. “You see something, you give it to us.”
“Copy,” Jersey said.
We went in.
The glass doors opened on a yawning space that would eventually be the main lobby. Right now it was a cavern of concrete and steel. Support columns jutted up into the gloom. The floor was half-covered in paper and plastic sheeting. Framed walls cut angles into open air, outlines of future rooms.
Light came from a mix of temporary work lamps and the few installed fixtures that had power. It made everything look grainy and unfinished, strong shadows between hard edges.
Our footsteps echoed.
We fanned out, staying in each other’s peripheral vision. Jersey and I moved center, straight up the main line from the doors. Snake Eyes and Spade drifted right, hugging the wall. Turnpike and Priest went left after watching the open second level above us until we were under it, guns sweeping.
“Clear left,” Spade murmured.
“Clear right,” Priest echoed.
“Feels like a horror movie,” Turnpike added under his breath.
“Shut up,” Priest said.
The front desk area was just a long, bare concrete island with wiring hanging out where polished stone and smiling staff would eventually be.
Behind it, a doorway led into what would be a back office.
Papers littered the half-finished counter.
A hard hat lay on the floor, cracked down one side like somebody had stepped on it.
I moved toward it, gun still up, and nudged it with the toe of my boot.
Dark flecks spotted the inside rim.
Blood.
“Got red,” I said. “Small. Old enough to be tacky, not old enough to be brown. No body.”
“Cameras?” Jersey asked.
“Lobby cam’s still down,” Miami replied. “Stairwell cam ahead of you is out too. I got nothing.”
“You’re sure?” I pressed.
“Wish I could be more useful,” he replied.
We crossed the lobby toward the bank of elevators and the stairwell access which were inside a service corridor that went both ways. The main elevator doors were installed but still covered in plastic. One had a smeared handprint in dust near the edge, like someone had leaned too hard on it.
The stairwell door was propped open with a paint can.
Inside, concrete steps spiraled up around a central shaft. Work lights ran along the wall every few landings.
“Up or sweep this floor first?” Snake Eyes asked.
“Quick sweep,” Jersey said. “We don’t go climbing until we know we’re not leaving something behind us.”