by Danika Stone
King was determined to find out why.
“You’re here,” he said, “because your informant Officer Brodie didn’t check in tonight.”
Gina’s fingers paused against her throat, eyes widening. The room was filled only by the murmuring of Patel. “…has anyone checked to see if he showed up at his apartment? There are cameras there…”
“Brodie didn’t check in?” Gina repeated, cheeks blanching.
King smirked. He liked her better when she was scared. “Your men should have told you that,” he sneered. “Or maybe they did.”
Her posture stiffened at the accusation. “No!” she hissed. “This is the first I’ve heard of it.”
King’s smile curdled, his eyes narrowing in disgust. He hated Gina Cerritos almost as much as he’d hated her brother, Rocco. He just wished that Gina had dug her own grave too.
Behind them, Patel’s voice rose. “… and you’re certain of that? The cameras show just two people going into the apartment? That’s it?”
“I know what you’ve been up to,” King growled. “I know because I’ve had people watching you.”
Gina gasped, nostrils flaring.
“I… I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Liar,” he sneered. “You’ve got half the Cerritos ready to turn on me!”
“They’re my family!” she snapped. “You can hardly accuse me of talking to them!”
Before King could answer, Patel cleared his throat, stepping toward the two of them. “Excuse me, sir,” he said coolly. “I have some news.”
Both King and Gina turned.
“Did you find him?” King asked. He wouldn’t admit it, but Luca’s disappearance bothered him in a way the others didn’t. There were few people that he trusted. Luca would be hard to replace, and even harder to dispose of, if it came down to it.
“No, sir,” Patel answered, “but I found out who he was with when he went back to his apartment.” He glanced up at Gina, glowering. “It was one of Rocco’s girls.”
“What?!” she cried.
“Rocco had a few favourites,” Patel continued. “Girls he tended to enjoy more than others.”
“Then what’s the delay?” King bellowed. “Bring her in!”
“It’s not that easy, sir. She doesn’t work at the club anymore. I don’t know her, but if the word on the street is right,” Patel said, his voice oily and smooth, “someone else here does.”
For a moment, his eyes caught on Gina’s. This time he didn’t look away.
“Bastard!” she screamed.
King stood up, hands in fists.
“You!” he bellowed, his finger jabbing toward Gina. “You set this up! This girl is working for you!”
“No!” Gina argued, “I don’t know what you’re talking—”
“Patel,” he barked. “Get rid of her!”
“You can’t, Tyrone!” Gina shouted, as Patel came forward, gun raised. “We’re family!”
“By marriage, not by blood,” he spat. “And that ends tonight.”
Patel took her arm, the gun pressed against her ribs.
“Come along now,” he said, “It’s time to go.”
Gina tugged against him, her eyes on King. “You wouldn’t dare!” she shrieked. “You’ll start a war, you bastard!”
“It’s a war you started!” King snarled. He pointed to the door. “Patel! Get rid of her, and make sure she isn’t found!”
Gina made a whimpering sound, as Patel caught hold of her again. He dragged her toward the door, his hand a claw on her arm.
“Keep walking, Ms. Cerritos,” Patel ordered. “I wouldn’t want to have to hurt you.”
In seconds they were gone, and King sat alone, revelling in the moment. He had men in the city now, searching for answers. Whoever else was working with Gina would soon be in his hands. He just needed to wait, and then he’d destroy them.
Somewhere in the distance, a siren began to keen, the sound bringing with it a decade-old memory. Ten years ago King had quelled a similar uprising. There’d been an upstart mobster who’d taken the first steps toward separating himself from King’s empire. The man owned properties along the waterfront, and he’d been skimming from his payouts. When King’s thugs had caught the man, he’d sworn his innocence, but by then it had been too late for amends. The warehouse had been doused with gasoline, the man tied to a chair in the upper floor, and the building set alight.
The sirens down on the street rose, and King chuckled.
The firemen who’d gone in had made it to that floor, but they hadn’t made it out alive. He hadn’t planned that part, but it gave him satisfaction all the same. You were only as powerful as you were feared, and the media storm that had followed that fire had done more for his power than a single death ever could.
Outside the windows, the sun reached the horizon, columns of light touching the buildings of the city. The sirens on the street abruptly stopped, and King smiled to himself, a great sense of peace riding over him. Something of terrible magnitude was unfolding tonight, but he was determined to rise above it. He’d done it before and he’d do it again.
‘Yes,’ he thought with dark humor. ‘I’ll smoke out the rats, then burn them all.’
Chapter 24: Fallout
Tyrone “King” Fischer’s federal trial had marked the end of an era in New York: the entire crime structure falling like a house of cards on the morning he was taken into custody. Information from the trial had been closely monitored, a gag order preventing the smallest details from emerging in the press. Despite the lack of official information, the trial gripped the city like a fever, news agencies staking out the courthouse, chasing the lawyers down the street. It was whispered that there’d been a mole inside the mafia family the entire time: Gina Cerritos’s name was bandied about. Whoever it was had willingly traded their information for the protection that came from the feds. And in the end, King, and eight of his closest confidantes, Luca Brin included, were convicted.
Indigo didn’t care. She was just glad it was over.
Her life, more than ever, had a new start, but the victory felt empty. Jude Alden was officially missing, but everyone knew he, like Marq Lopez, was likely dead. She and Elliot got together in the spring, sharing a bottle of Jack Daniels and burning a pile of Jude’s old clothing and comic books on the roof of Indigo’s apartment, crying together as they said goodbye.
The last item Indigo threw in was his note.
Tonight she sat side by side with Shireese, watching videos on her newly-purchased laptop. She would be graduating soon, and moving off on her own, but for now, she was content to have one last night when everything was the same. On the spur of the moment, she clicked open her documentary. The two of them watched, in silence, as the film played: Indigo’s life summarized in snapshots and music, pictures of her flickering from childhood through adolescence, the images morphing into the woman she was today.
The last section of the film was the very first scene Indigo had edited months earlier in Professor Yamamoto’s class: she and Shireese drinking beer on the roof of the apartment building, the two of them dancing at O’Reilly’s, the apartment in disarray, Indigo asleep on the couch, Tanis standing next to Shireese at a concert, Indigo laughing behind them. Joy and friendship and life lived.
The music faded, and one final scene appeared.
It was Indigo, staring out the window of a train, the light flickering in the darkness. Indigo looked up at the camera, frowning. From offscreen, a voice appeared.
“So was it worth it?” Jude asked.
Indigo cleared her throat, eyes red-rimmed and weary.
“What’s that?”
“Going home again,” the voice answered. “Seeing your mother after all that time.”
She chewed her lip, then nodded.
“Yeah,” she answered. “It was.” She put her head back against the glass, turning away from him. “It was a… good start.”
For a few seconds, the camera rested on h
er profile, focusing and refocusing on her face.
“Thanks,” Jude said, almost to himself. “For letting me come along.”
Indigo didn’t answer.
The camera jiggled, and the screen went back, the music fading away to nothing. Both women were sobbing, the apartment more empty than it’d been minutes before.
“He’s really gone, isn’t he?” Indigo choked.
Shireese reached out, pulling her into her arms.
“He is,” she whispered. “But you’re still here...”
: : : : : : : : : :
Fran saw Nathan through the crowd. He was small and wiry, his hair short again, much more the bright-eyed cadet she remembered, rather than the wearied undercover agent he’d become over the years. She waited by the other delegates, smiling as he neared.
“It’s good to see you again, Nathan,” Fran said. “I wasn’t sure you’d still be here once the trial ended.”
“Time enough to head off on vacation,” he laughed. “I want to make sure the last loose ends are tied up before I go.”
“Glad to hear it,” Fran said with a smile. “I owe you one.”
He shook his head, his expression pained, and then controlled once more. The time had changed him, and even a new haircut couldn’t put all of it back.
“Just doing my job, Commissioner.”
“Have you thought of what you’ll do next?” she asked. “Now that you’re back on the force?”
Nathan tipped his head to the side, considering.
“Well, I’ve got a backlog of paperwork to do,” he chuckled, “but after that I thought I might consider being a detective. A desk job might be a nice change.”
Fran smirked.
“Detective Patel,” she said with a wink. “I like it.”
Chapter 1: One Year Later
Working at Los Alamos wasn’t the worst job Julian Davis had ever had. Far from it. It was, however, the most demanding.
He spent long hours struggling to unravel the complicated intricacies of online security. The internet underworld was where the real crime took place these days, and the Los Alamos base was where the government fought it. There were hundreds of people employed by this particular division of Homeland Security, the group of them spending their days in cubicles, trawling the internet, every keystroke recorded for posterity.
Some of these people Julian knew by reputation: the kid who’d hacked into the FBI mainframe, the virus programmer who’d brought Google to a grinding halt, and the teenage genius who’d designed the now-illegal interface for file-sharing. Others, Julian had met on-base: working out at the gym, or buying groceries at the on-base store. They were the best and the brightest from the tech world, and every single one of them had been brought in for the express purpose of protecting the US from attack. All of them lived in the gated community which surrounded Los Alamos. All of them were officially in jail, serving life sentences for their actions.
All of them, like Julian Davis, had a new identity.
For the first months after his official ‘disappearance’, Jules had simply struggled to keep up. The Fischer trial had dragged on for months, the end unimaginably far away. Jules had testified in closed court, earning him his second chance. A change from a jail cell, to Homeland Security – even when he had to wear a tracker twenty-four hours a day – seemed like a fair enough trade-off. Jules had a comfortable income, and a house, and a car, a retirement plan, and health benefits. With all that’d happened since last year, Jules didn’t regret a lot of what he’d left behind. And when he thought of what the alternative was – a prison sentence, in a real prison – it seemed like a good choice.
Most of the time.
In the past months, he’d finally begun to feel settled. He was keeping up with his workload, and had earned his first ‘points’ that could be used for off-base passes. The trouble was, he couldn’t forget Indigo. She was there, on the edge of his consciousness, waiting to be found.
The first time he looked her up, he discovered she’d graduated from university, and was applying for work at various design firms around the country. He spent an evening looking through the images she had posted on her locked Facebook page. The next morning, Jules was called into his supervisor’s office. Admiral Janet Artola gave him the same “You need to remember that she’s being protected by NOT knowing about you,” speech she’d given him when he had arrived. He earned ten demerits for the infraction, and his workload increased.
Jules left it at that.
The second time he found Indigo was almost an accident. He’d been battling depression for weeks, and Morgan Drake, once known as DemonDark, had suggested he give online dating a try. Jules had typed in his information on a whim, leaving the picture bare. (He didn’t want to give Artola any more ammunition than she needed.) Jules left his profile untouched for a week, before going back to look through his matches. Finding he had none – it appeared everyone wanted to see who they were talking to – Jules began probing the site.
The first name he searched for, once he’d hacked the program, was Indigo Sykes.
She was there.
He read through her file, heart in his throat. She was working in Colorado at a web design studio. She had listed a number of hobbies and interests, but no pictures at all. He stared at the summary at the bottom of the page.
I’m not looking for perfect anymore. I’m just looking for something good.
Jules began typing.
: : : : : : : : : :
Indigo sat in the coffee house, her eyes on the people milling through the snowy streets. She’d only tried the online dating to get Shireese off her back. They might live halfway across the country from one another these days, but that had never stopped her friend from trying to help. Indigo had decided she’d do this one date, and that was it. Shireese would be happy and she could move on. It was like the obsession Shireese’d had with Elliot last year. He was nice but there was definitely no click.
Today, Indigo was certain, would be the same.
Indigo sighed, fiddling with the handle of the coffee cup. The year had changed more than just where she lived. Her priorities had changed too. Indigo didn’t worry about the ‘right one’ anymore. Nowadays, she thought long term, about compatibility and friendship. Sometimes, it was hard enough just to get up in the morning, but Indigo figured if she kept going long enough, that one day, she might just find a way to be happy again.
She took a sip of coffee, her mind flickering to another time.
‘Maybe…’
The street was busy, the sunlight on snow leaving her squinting. Outside, a figure passed, and Indigo leaned forward, her eyes following him as he moved through the crowd. There was something about his walk – the gait of it, and the way he held his head – that, even from the back, had her heart pounding. The man disappeared back into the milling bodies, and Indigo slumped down, chest tight.
‘Maybe…’ she thought morosely, ‘I’m not ready after all.’
She set the coffee down with shaking fingers, reaching for her coat, hung over the chair behind her. The door opened at the front of the shop, a gust of icy wind leaving her shivering. She pulled on one sleeve, turning to put on the other, but stopped before she could finish.
Jude Alden was standing a few steps away.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: An ‘A’ for Effort
Chapter 2: Finding the Cache Files
Chapter 3: Secrets Hidden in Plain Sight
Chapter 4: Scuffed Up Surfaces
Chapter 5: Tyrone ‘King’ Fischer
Chapter 6: Things I Haven’t Told You
Chapter 7: View from the Fifteenth Floor
Chapter 8: Maybe
Chapter 9: Opening the Vault
Chapter 10: Bad Taste
Chapter 11: Caught in the Act
Chapter 12: The Long Road Home
Chapter 13: Taking a Stand
Chapter 14: Questions and Answers
Chapter 15: The File of Franc
esca Williams
Chapter 16: Money’s not an Issue
Chapter 17: The Other Side of the Window
Chapter 18: The Rest of the Story
Chapter 19: The Word on the Street
Chapter 20: From the Outside
Chapter 21: Last Second Plans
Chapter 22: Taking Position
Chapter 23: The Power Shift
Chapter 24: Fallout
Chapter 25: One Year Later