CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
ETHAN
I called my wife and let her know so she didn't see my location and think the worst, like I was being buried in some shallow grave.
She was distracted by something, I picked up on it within the first two minutes of our call.
She didn't give much away but promised she'd tell me whatever it was when I got home.
That made me eager to get this over with.
I slowed and scanned. There were no headlights, and we had no tail.
It was silent too, nothing but the hum of the engine.
I killed the lights and got out. The hinges groaned as I shoved the gates open, gravel scraped under my soles.
I checked once more to make sure we were good, then slid back into the driver's seat.
The car rolled through, slow and deliberate. I stopped just inside, climbed back out, and pushed the gates shut behind us. I didn't bother latching them—if we needed to leave, I wanted out fast.
"Charming," Eric drawled, eyes on the skeletal shadows of the site as I got back in. "If OSHA saw this place, they'd just torch it and start over."
I grunted, driving deeper, flipping on the low beams. They carved the site into sharp fragments.
A crane frozen in rust, tarps whipping like flags, dumpsters spilling warped wood and insulation.
Graffiti scrawled over a shipping container, some fresh, layered on top of older tags.
Weeds shoved through gravel even worse down here.
Puddles of rainwater gleamed in ruts where grading had gone wrong. This wasn't active. It hadn't been for months.
"You talk to Knox yet?" Eric asked.
I thumbed my phone. One call, two. Both had gone straight to voicemail. Our last few texts were left unread. "No. He's ghosting, apparently."
"Or dead in a ditch." Eric shrugged. "Fifty-fifty."
"You know this isn't like him. He's been off for the past few days."
"Probably the ditch then," he suggested.
I knew better than to keep this line of conversation going. He'd start getting creative with how he came to be in the ditch next. We pulled closer to the heart of the site. Off to the left, concrete pads waited for foundations that would never be poured.
To the right, I noticed something else. Sections of ground that looked wrong. Too smooth, the dirt pressed flat but uneven in places. It was regraded—hasty and intentional. I said nothing, just eased the car to a stop.
Eric flicked a glance at me, then at the vast property in the distance. "So. What's the play?"
“We wait."
For a few minutes, we sat there in the dark. Insects chirred. My irritation mounted. Knox was supposed to be here. Instead, it felt like we were the ones being waited on.
"You stay out here. If Knox shows, or anyone else, you call. If something feels wrong, you call. The car stays running."
He smirked and adjusted his glasses, already checking the pistol at his back. "Daddy letting me babysit the perimeter."
I pulled on leather gloves I’d brought along, slid the envelope’s key into my pocket, checked my Colt, and grabbed one of the flashlights we'd brought along.
I got out, Eric doing the same thing on the other side, but only I set off.
The night closed in as I walked. My boots crunched across gravel as I swept the flashlight beam ahead, the skeletal outline of steel rising like ribs around me.
A tarp hung from a beam like a curtain and, when the wind hit it, it hid whatever was beyond. I lost sight of Eric within minutes; his silhouette had been visible near the car and then gone.
I kept going, the flashlight cutting through the dark until it opened out into a flatter stretch.
The light swung wide and landed on it a slab of concrete poured in a far corner, recent enough that the edges hadn't fully scarred over.
More blue tarps drooped from the beams above, blocking the full view.
Whoever had been here had wanted parts hidden.
I noted the location and walked a bit further, boots crunching.
I wasn't looking for anything particular, just casing the property to see what we were dealing with and trying to make sense of the GPS points Saint had written down, when a structure seemed to rise out of nowhere.
It was a trailer, sat tucked back near another unfinished slab, dull and small against the night. The faded number on the door matched the brass key in my pocket. I approached it slowly and climbed the steps. The lock turned smooth, as if it had been waiting for me to find it.
Inside the air hit me stale and sour. The light made everything look older.
There was a bolted desk, a half-busted filing cabinet, blueprints rolled and curling, molded coffee cups like little fossils.
Papers were scattered everywhere. I crouched, gloved fingers rifling through the mess.
I didn't know what the fuck I was looking for. Saint hadn't been very specific.
What I did find were things most people wouldn't leave behind.
Ledgers, wire transfers, incident reports with lines drawn through names.
Accidents logged, then struck from the record.
A payroll ledger with what I could almost guarantee were ghost employees.
Transfer slips routed through most likely shell companies.
It read like a messy manual for how you erase people and money.
A sudden noise made me freeze.
I killed the flashlight, plunging the trailer into darkness as my hand went automatically to my piece. There were sounds that meant danger and sounds that meant presence. This one was both. Footsteps crossed the gravel outside, then stopped at the bottom of the steps.
I shifted into the shadow beside the filing cabinet, gun already raised when the door opened. A woman's silhouette appeared in the doorway. I lifted the gun, and then I saw her face.
"Lila?"
She stopped dead, flinching back at sight of my gun. "Jesus Christ."
"What the fuck are you doing here, Marino?"
I lowered the gun, but not my temper. She stepped inside, eyes moving from the weapon to my face. She was dressed, nothing like she'd been at the office earlier. Jeans, boots, dark sweater, hair pulled back. A small flashlight was clenched in one hand, a leather cross-body bag against her hip.
"What does it look like I'm doing?"
"It looks like you're trying to get yourself shot."
"I didn't know you'd be here,” she hastily explained.
"Bullshit."
Her expression hardened. "Believe whatever makes you happy."
"How did you even find this place?"
"I was told to come here, which is why I didn’t think you’d be here too." She moved past me, sweeping her flashlight over the desk. "Someone wanted it to be found."
"Who?"
"I don't know and if I did, why wouldn’t you?"
I stared at her. She stared right back. Neither of us moved in the cramped dark.
"Who gave you the address?"
"I got a message."
My jaw tightened. "From?"
She sighed heavily. "Unknown number."
"And you decided to drive forty-five minutes outside Miami by yourself in the middle of the fucking night?"
"I didn't realize I needed your permission."
"You need common sense."
"I have plenty,” she retorted with obvious irritation.
"Apparently not."
She rolled her eyes and moved toward the desk. I caught her arm—just above the wrist, where the dark sweater had ridden up slightly. "Don't touch anything."
Her gaze dropped to my hand before returning to my face, something measured in it. "I know how evidence works, Ethan."
"Then you know better than to contaminate it."
"I'm wearing gloves."
She lifted her free hand, fingers spread. Black nitrile, same as mine. I released her and took a step back.
"Where's your car?"
"Far side of the property."
"Why?" I probed.
"The gate I found was chained and only an idiot would drive in through the front."
Was that a dig at me? That explained why Eric hadn't seen her come in. It didn't explain enough for everything else.
"Show me the message."
She pulled her phone from her back pocket, tapped through it, and held the screen toward me. The light from it was the brightest thing in the trailer. An unknown number. An address. A set of coordinates. And three words, typed in capitals like someone wanted to make sure they landed.
LOOK UNDERNEATH EVERYTHING.
I read it twice. "When did you get this?"
"Seven twelve, yesterday."
Fuck. I handed the phone back. "You should've told us."
"Considering I'm currently everyone's favorite suspected criminal mastermind, forgive me for not immediately calling a family meeting."
"This isn't a fucking joke."
"I know." Something shifted in her voice.
The sharpness that was usually there, the edge she kept honed and ready, went quiet.
For once there was no flirtation tucked beneath her words, no small provocation coiled and waiting.
She looked tired. The kind that had been building for days, that no amount of composure fully covered.
"Cortez drops my name into this mess, and suddenly people I've worked with for two years look at me like I'm carrying a bomb under my clothes.
" Her mouth twisted into something that wasn't quite a smile.
"So, if someone sends me coordinates to an abandoned construction site connected to the same shit, I'm going to find out why. "
"Alone?"
"Who exactly was I supposed to trust?"
I didn't answer. The rain had started to fall outside, faint against the metal roof. Her laugh held no humor at my lack of reply.
"Exactly."
I felt a surge of irritation, she was right. I pivoted back to the folding metal desk crowded with ledgers and manila folders. “We document what’s here. Nothing leaves tonight,” I said, raising my camera again.
Her eyes flicked to me. “I know.”
“And you stay where I can see you.”
That earned a faint, wry curve at the corner of her mouth. She brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “Careful, Mr. Marcelli.”
I leveled my gaze on her.
“You almost made that sound like concern.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” I replied briskly.