Chapter 14 #3
The night swallowed me whole the second I stepped beyond the gates of the resort.
The roads were quiet. The streetlights here were duller, some flickering like they hadn’t been touched in months.
The occasional buzz of insects and the distant hum of a boat on the water were the only reminders that the world still breathed.
Each step I took echoed louder in my own head than it ever could out here. The pavement stretched long in front of me, and I walked it like it owed me something—like it held the answers hidden in the shadows I wasn’t afraid to chase anymore.
The jacket clung to my skin, trapping the heat against my back, but I didn’t remove it. I needed the weight. The discomfort. It reminded me that I was still in control—that no matter how much I felt, I could hold it in.
My mind kept circling back to the conversation I overheard. To the name Damyen whispered in unease. To the way the voice cracked when he mentioned Rafael.
They’d ambushed him. Hurt him. Could’ve killed him. And now they were planning something more.
I should’ve told Rafael. But I knew him. He would’ve shut me down, told me to stay out of it, reminded me with that maddening voice of his that his world wasn’t mine.
Except it was.
It became mine the second my family’s blood painted my childhood. The second I chose revenge over grief. And the second I saved his life that night at the casino.
I didn’t do it for him. I did it for me. But now… now the lines were blurring. And I didn’t like that.
The night air thickened as I walked farther, past quiet houses, a sleeping gas station, and streets that grew more uneven with every step. Cartagena was beautiful, but it had its forgotten edges—the parts tourists didn’t see. That suited me just fine.
Every minute dragged like an hour. The sound of my boots on cracked stone. The way my eyes scanned every corner, every rustle in the shadows. I was careful. Kellan was tracking me. Ash was waiting. I wasn’t completely alone.
But the closer I got, the more I felt like I was walking into something I couldn’t name. A gut instinct. That quiet scream under the surface.
I clutched the phone in my pocket like it might slip from my grip if I didn’t. My fingers brushed the holster at my waist. The cool press of metal was comforting.
Almost there.
The buildings grew tighter, older. The kind of place where everything had chipped paint and bars on the windows, where people didn’t ask questions and didn’t want answers.
I moved slower now. Quieter.
And then I saw them. Three men standing near the side of a worn-down building with flaking brick and a rusted door.
They weren’t laughing. They weren’t joking.
One lit a cigarette with a shaky hand. Another kept glancing over his shoulder like something might leap from the dark and rip his throat out.
I pressed myself behind a tree, heart suddenly thudding against my ribs—not from fear, but from readiness. My eyes locked onto them, watching. Waiting.
I’d made it. And something was about to happen.
I crouched lower behind the wall, the rough stone biting into my legs through the fabric of my pants.
I didn’t care. My eyes stayed locked on the men just a few feet away.
The light from the lamppost above them cast jagged shadows over their faces, but I could still make out enough.
The nervous way one of them paced. The way another kept fiddling with something in his hand—keys, maybe.
The third leaned against the wall like he had no interest in being there at all.
I inched closer, slow and silent, slipping behind a stack of wooden crates and old rusted barrels at the edge of the lot.
Get closer without being seen.
It was like second nature now, moving in the dark.
One of the guys muttered something, low and clipped. I held my breath. “He said 2:45. If he’s not here, we’re out.”
That voice—it was the shaky one. The kid who was too green to be standing guard for anything more than a warehouse full of fruit. But here he was, sweating bullets while waiting for Damyen.
They were talking about Rafael again. About the ambush. About something that happened that wasn’t supposed to.
“You think he’ll show?” the one leaning asked.
“Of course he’ll show,” the second snapped. “He’s not done with this place yet. He has one more job before they pull him out.”
Pull him out.
My fingers curled against the brick. So he was being relocated. Transferred. Hidden. Because someone higher than him knew what he’d done.
I didn’t know if that someone was Viktor or someone even worse—but it didn’t matter. They weren’t just covering up the ambush. They were making sure Rafael wouldn’t live long enough to retaliate.
He saved my life that night, my brain whispered. But that’s not why you care.
No. That wasn’t why at all.
The sound of boots scraping stone made me freeze. The door to the building creaked open, and the men disappeared inside—except one. Of course. One stayed behind.
He stood right in front of the door, arms crossed, a gun holstered openly at his side. His gaze swept the street, bored and half-lidded, but I wasn’t stupid enough to think he wasn’t alert. I swore under my breath and dropped lower behind the crates.
Think. Think. You’ve been in worse situations than this. You didn’t survive all these years to get caught slipping now.
There was no going through the front. Not unless I wanted to see if I was faster than a bullet.
Spoiler: I wasn’t.
I slipped out of the alley and stayed to the shadows, circling the building carefully, boots light and silent. The back was darker. No lights. No guards. No sound except for the night around me.
I crept toward the rear entrance. A rusted metal door stood crooked in its frame, chained and padlocked like it hadn’t been opened in years. I reached out, testing the handle. Locked. Of course.
I pulled back and exhaled slowly. Then I reached down to my boot. A small, thin case rested inside—matte black and flat as a credit card. I flipped it open. Inside were a few basic picks. I wasn’t a master, but I’d learned from the best.
My father taught me when I was barely ten. A game, he said. Figure out how to get in without a key, and I’ll give you your own set.
I never lost that game.
I knelt in front of the door and slipped the pick into the lock, wiggling it gently until I found the tension point.
One click. Then another. My heart pounded. Sweat clung to the back of my neck, and I wasn’t sure if it was from the heat or the risk. Probably both.
Come on… come on…
A third click.
I twisted the pick slowly, felt the last pin shift—and then the lock gave. My breath hitched. I stood up and slowly unwound the chain, careful not to make a sound, metal links sliding against each other like a whisper.
The door creaked open an inch. I slipped my tools back into the case and tucked it into my boot. And then I stepped into the dark.
The door closed behind me with a soft snick that still echoed louder in my ears than it should have.
The air inside was stale, thick with the scent of sweat, dust, and something metallic that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
I moved slowly, one step at a time, careful not to let my boots make a sound on the cracked concrete floor.
No one was in sight. Not yet.
I let out a slow breath, steadying my pulse, and adjusted the holster under my jacket.
My hand hovered near the grip of my gun as I crept forward through the shadows.
Empty crates and rusted machinery cluttered the space like abandoned skeletons—relics of whatever life this building used to have before it became a hiding spot for men like them.
Move quietly. Stay small. Eyes everywhere.
It was instinct now.
A hallway stretched ahead, and I followed it, ears straining for any sound—footsteps, breathing, voices.
Then I heard it. Faint, at first. Like a radio playing too low. But as I moved closer, I saw the flicker of light leaking from a cracked door at the end of the corridor. I crouched down beside it, spine pressed against the wall, and slipped my gun from its holster.
Just in case.
The wood was old, warped, and left just enough of a gap to let me see shadows moving inside—figures pacing, one seated. I couldn’t make out faces from this angle. But the voices carried clearer now, low and sharp.
“He’s a problem. And not just for us anymore.” A man’s voice—calm, even. Like this was a boardroom and not a conspiracy.
“Rafael always was. But we knew that going in.” The seated man spoke this time, a slower drawl. My stomach coiled.
They were talking about him again.
“Cartel wasn’t supposed to know the details. They were the cover story. We let them believe it was about the shipment, but this…” a pause, then a hiss of breath, “…this is about blood.”
I clenched my jaw.
So the Cartel wasn’t behind the ambush. They were just the lie. The smokescreen. My fingers tightened on the gun, but I didn’t move.
Another voice jumped in. This one anxious, like he was out of his depth. “You think Viktor will handle it?”
That name. Viktor.
My pulse skipped.
“Viktor always handles things. He has the Italians now. And they’re waiting for a reason to finally move. Rafael gave them one the moment he set foot in Cartagena.”
My mind reeled. The Italian Mafia.
It wasn’t about a lost shipment or cartel tension. This was deeper. Twisted. Years in the making. They were using the city as a stage. And Rafael—he was the target. The symbol. The threat that had to be cut down.
The men inside laughed softly. Not cruel. Confident. “Let him think he’s safe. He’s not. We’ll let him bleed slow.”
I felt the ice in those words creep down my spine like a blade.
I had to go.
I pressed a hand to my knee to ground myself, the cold metal of my ring biting into my skin.
You’ve heard enough. Now move.