Chapter 20 #4
We moved through the ground level in a pattern of slices—small halls, service elevators, future offices, mechanical rooms humming softly. Every time we passed a window, the boardwalk lights flashed by in fragmented glimpses, the world outside was still turning.
We found more signs of an interruption.
A spilled box of screws near a maintenance closet. A clipboard on the floor with a footprint stamped across the paperwork. A security radio lying in a corner, casing cracked, battery half-out.
But no people.
“It feels like everybody just… evaporated,” Priest murmured.
We regrouped near the stairwell.
“Up,” Jersey said.
So, we climbed.
The second floor was future conference rooms and office suites, walls framed but not finished. A bathroom where the toilets sat wrapped in plastic.
“Third floor,” Snake Eyes said, reading the stenciled numbers on the landing as we kept moving.
We cleared the next few levels in a pattern that got old fast—framed-out hallways, plastic-wrapped toilets, dropped clipboards, somebody’s half-eaten food having gone down hard on a folding table. No voices. No footsteps. Just the sense that whatever had been breathing in here had already moved on.
We worked methodically. Each level had its own flavor of incompletion. Some had carpeting rolled out but not cut. Some had light fixtures stacked in boxes. On one, the walls were painted but the ceiling was still open, guts of the building exposed.
On the sixth floor, we found the first obvious mark.
A smear of blood along the stairwell wall at shoulder height. Not huge. Just a swipe. Like someone had grabbed for balance and left a part of themselves behind.
Beneath it, something small and dark lay on the step.
I crouched, keeping my gun hand up, and plucked it up with two fingers.
A gold earring. Delicate. Expensive. Shaped like a tiny vine with leaves.
“Roman’s wife?” Jersey asked.
“Or his daughter,” I said, turning it in the light. “Either way, not a mere construction worker’s.”
I slipped it into a vest pocket. Evidence. Proof. Something to hand back if we got the chance.
“You’re on six?” Miami’s voice came through. “Still can’t see anything. But a few cameras higher up aren’t out yet.”
“You sure?” Spade asked. “This place is a maze. They could be playing hide and seek with our heads.”
“Trust me,” Miami said. “If there was a crowd up there, I’d know. I’ve got cams on eight, ten, and twelve flickering. Looks like someone cut power to parts of the system but not others. But… fuck.”
My grip tightened. “What?”
“That van on the street side?” he said. “It’s gone.”
“Gone how?” Jersey asked.
“Gone as in I looked back at that camera to see if I could read a plate and now there’s just an empty curb,” Miami replied.
“Could’ve just driven off quietly,” Turnpike said. “These streets are a clusterfuck. You can slip away quick.”
“Or they’re on the way back with help,” I said.
We kept climbing.
Seven. Eight.
Every floor we stepped onto, I expected to hear something. A voice. A cry. A cough. The metallic clack of a gun being handled. Even rats. Something.
All we got was the steady hum of systems and the uneven thud of our own boots.
On nine, Snake Eyes held up a hand, head tilted.
We froze.
For a second, all I heard was my heartbeat in my ears.
Then, faintly, a metallic clink from somewhere above us. A door shutting. Or something being set down.
“Direction?” Priest whispered.
“Up,” Snake Eyes said.
We moved slower now, every sense stretched thin.
Tenth floor.
The layout here was different. Bigger open spans meant for ballrooms and high-limit gaming. The boardwalk side was one long sweep of glass, floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over the dark ocean and the scattered lights below.
Ladders stood in the middle of empty space. Rolls of carpet leaned against half-finished walls. In one corner, a cluster of folding chairs sat around a makeshift table, empty coffee cups and a deck of cards abandoned on top.
It felt like walking into a backstage area after a show left town.
“Still nothing on your cams?” Jersey asked quietly.
“Nothing moving,” Miami said. “Just you. It’s wrong, man. This whole feed feels… wrong.”
My skin crawled.
We pushed forward, clearing the floor in segments, staying low near the heavier structures, avoiding standing pure silhouetted in front of those big glass panes.
On the far side of the floor, near what would eventually be the elevator lobby, I saw something that made my stomach drop.
Zip ties.
A bunch of them. Some still looped, ends cut. Some stretched out and stained dark. They lay scattered near a support column like someone had cut people loose in a hurry—or had taken what they’d left and gone.
“Here,” I said.
Jersey moved up beside me, eyes tracking over the plastic cuffs.
“Fuck,” he muttered.
“Whoever brought them here had enough time to tie and untie,” Snake Eyes said as he approached us. “This wasn’t a smash-and-grab. This was controlled.”
“Or they moved them,” I said. “Somewhere else in the building. Or out.”
“Any sign of Vladimir yet?” Blackjack’s voice came through now, tighter. He was listening from the second team’s position around the block.
“Not yet,” Jersey said. “No bodies. No enemies. No hostages. Just signs something already happened.”
My heart thudded once. Twice.
This building was supposed to be Roman’s crown. His mark on this city’s skyline. Right now, it felt like a hollow tooth waiting for infection.
“Tell me what your gut says,” he asked me quietly.
“That we’re too late,” I said. “And early. At the same time.”
He grimaced. “Hate it when you talk like that.”
I took a breath that felt like it went in sideways.
“Blackjack,” I said into the mic. “It’s all wrong in here.”
“Define wrong,” he replied.
“Too clean,” I said. “Too empty. No hostiles. No friendlies. Just traces. Zip ties. Blood smears. Half-eaten meal. Like someone moved through, did what they needed to do, and then scrubbed the place of anything living.”
“Could be they took them higher,” he said. “Rooftop. Future ballroom. Somewhere more dramatic.”
“Could be,” I said. “Or they already walked them back out another door and we’re standing in a picture after the fact.”
There was a pause on the line.
“Pull back?” he asked.
I looked out at the black hulk of the ocean through the glass. The reflection showed six leather-clad figures among concrete and steel and hanging wires.
Every instinct I had was humming.
“Not yet,” Jersey said. “Give us one more floor. If it still feels like this, we reevaluate.”
“Make it quick,” Blackjack said. “Tesauro’s not going to give us a script. He’s already improvising on the fly.”
“Copy,” Jersey replied.
We turned toward the stairwell again and continued moving.
The next flight up felt heavier under my boots. Every creak of the floor, every flicker of the work lights, every gust of air through the open elevator shaft felt like the building breathing around us.
My thumb brushed the edge of the key at my throat.
Crown or coffin, I thought.
Roman might have built this place to mark his rise. Tesauro might be turning it into the place where everything broke instead.
We were going to find out which one it was.
And whether or not we walked back down those stairs to tell the story.