Chapter 149
Chapter 149
-Hailey-
We followed a potholed access road that ran next to a set of train tracks.
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About a half mile up the tracks, a security light on a tall pole cast a sickly white beam through the darkness. It was the only light for miles.
“This is far enough,” Sam murmured. She slowed the car and pulled off the road, bumping over the uneven ground until we were hidden in the deep shadow of a crumbling brick building.
She killed the engine and the headlights, plunging us into darkness and silence that let me hear the blood rushing in my
cars.
“Follow the tracks,” she said, pointing in the direction of the distant light. “That’s where you’re meeting him. Place hasn’t been used in about ten years, but the city never disconnected the lights. They claim it keeps the riffraff out, but really it just makes it easier for the riffraff to see.”
She sighed heavily. “Anyway, they’re motion–activated. The lights. You’ll trip them walking in. He’ll see you coming.” She urned to me, and her face was all sharp angles and shadows. “I’ll find a spot closer, somewhere with a sightline. I’ll be istening.”
She reached past me into the glove compartment and pulled out a small flesh–colored earpiece. “Here. It’s live. Just speak normally and I’ll hear you.”
I fitted the cold plastic bud into my ear. The action felt horrifically familiar. Sam tapped a button on the transmitter.
‘Test. Hailey, you read me?” Her voice was suddenly inside my head, crisp and clear.
‘Loud and clear,” I said quietly.
‘Good.” Her voice was in my ear again. “Remember the word. I’ll be waiting for it. Or for anything else.” She gave my arm a brief, hard squeeze. “Go.”
I nodded. I couldn’t speak past the sudden lump in my throat.
I pushed the car door open and the cold night air wrapped around me. I didn’t look back at Sam. I stepped onto the gravel, pulled up the hood of Logan’s sweatshirt again, and started walking toward the light.
The gravel crunched under my boots. I was thirty feet from the car when the first security light snapped on with a loud click–hum, flooding the area in a harsh, sterile white. I froze for a second, caught like a deer. My shadow stretched out long and thin beside me.
I kept walking, and it kept going on like that. Every time a security light snapped on, my skeleton tried to claw its way out of my skin.
I was approaching the railyard now. This was it. The stage was set.
I walked into the center of the light and stopped, turning a slow circle.
Completely and utterly alone.
Somewhere in the distance, a piece of sheet metal rattled in the wind. I pulled the hood’s drawstring a little bit tighter.
Under the brutal white glare, every flaw was illuminated. I looked down at my hands, and they suddenly looked very small.
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3:35 pm P P P P
Chapter 149
These were the hands that had held onto Matt, believing his lies. They’d worn his engagement ring.
And they were the hands that shot him. Removed him from my life forever.
These hands had traced the ink on Logan’s skin. Caressed his face. Clung to him in the dark.
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It was almost dizzying to think about… the path that turned a timid girl in a too–small town into this woman standing in a wasteland, waiting to face a monster.
I thought of the day I’d packed my bags and moved to Riverstone with Matt, sure that any direction was better than staying
still.
I thought of my mother, who had gone to stay with my aunt like I’d asked her to. She was probably lying awake right now, worried sick about me and Abby. I hoped Abby had called her recently. One of us should be a good daughter.
I thought of the first time I saw Logan across the bar. He was a storm contained in a man, and I had felt that immediate, terrifying, electric pull.
Every decision, every stumble, every moment of weakness, and every spark of defiance had been a road on this map. And they all converged on this single, blinding patch of gravel under a security light in the middle of nowhere.
I had asked for this meeting. I’d chosen this. The weight of that choice pressed down on me, heavy as ever. I needed this to be done.
The sound was so low at first I thought it was the wind. A deep, smooth purr. It grew steadily louder, turning into the sound of an engine and the crunch of tires moving slowly over gravel.
My head snapped up. Beyond my circle of light, headlights cut through the darkness.
A car. A black Mercedes sedan, rolling in like a predator. It crunched to a stop just at the edge of the darkness, facing me, engine idling.
‘Hailey,” Sam’s voice crackled in my ear and made me jump. “I’ve got visual. Just the one vehicle. No sign of any others. No foot patrols that I can see. You’re clear.”
Yeah. For now.
The driver’s side door remained closed. The passenger door remained closed. The car just sat there, waiting. I could feel eyes on me, watching me through its impenetrably tinted windows.
Illegally dark tint, I thought. I should report it to Ramirez.
The rear door of the Mercedes finally opened. A polished black shoe touched the gravel, then another.
Anatoly unfurled himself from the car with an unhurried, terrifying grace.
The movement reminded me of an octopus pouring itself out of a jar. He looked as though he should have more limbs, like some kind of eldritch horror. But that was probably just the way I’d drawn him in my head.
He stood to his full height and straightened the cuffs of his suit jacket. He didn’t look at me.
His eyes scanned the darkness behind me instead, past the circle of light, as if he could see straight through the dark.
He took a slow, intentional breath of the night air, like he was savoring it.
Then he spoke. His voice was calm, deep, and not projected at me. It was projected into the darkness.
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3:35 pm P P P P
Chapter 148
“Okay, bananas. That works. If you think you’ll be able to slip it into conversation.”
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“No,” I said quickly. “Sorry. That’s… that’s the word Logan and I used when–well, on the night you and I first met, actually.
At…”
At Matt’s house. Standing over Matt’s corpse.
And this situation felt awfully similar to that one. Except this time I didn’t have the comfort of a gun tucked into my waistband.
“Hailey.” Sam’s voice cut through my mental spiral. “You with me? You just went white as a sheet.”
I blinked, forcing myself back into the present, away from the image of Matt’s blood seeping across his living room floor.
“I’m fine,” I lied, clearing my throat. “How about ‘Russia?‘ I won’t have trouble sneaking that one into a sentence.”
“Russia.” She studied me for a few seconds with her cop eyes. “Alright,” she agreed.
I knew she hadn’t bought my lie. She just chose to move past it. “We need to get going. They’ll be out looking for you soon. Ramirez won’t keep them occupied forever. His hard–on for nailing Logan is the only reason this worked.”
She pulled out her phone. “He’s had a thing for me since he transferred in. Thinks we’re kindred spirits because we’re both by–the–book.‘ Thinks my frustration with the department’s politics means I’m secretly on his side.”
A humorless smirk twisted her lips. “Men like him are so predictable. They see a woman who’s good at her job and assume she must be as rigid and lonely as they are. He was all too happy to play bad cop tonight. Gave him a chance to swing his dick around in front of the club.”
She put the phone to her ear and it rang twice.
“Ramirez,” she said, shifting her voice into professionalism. “It’s Andrews. Stand down. The package is secure. Disengage and fall back.” A pause. She rolled her eyes slightly, a gesture meant for me. “No, Javier, it’s handled. Your part’s done.”
She pressed the brake and the ignition button, and her car purred to life.
“Yeah. Thank you. Now I need you to do something else. Rally your units. I’m texting you a location. Meet me there but keep your distance. Set up a perimeter. Do not, I repeat, do not move in until you get my signal. This is a sensitive negotiation.”
I could hear his voice through the phone, but not the words. Sam sighed and ended the call without another word, dropping the phone into the cupholder.
She took a deep breath, recentering herself. “Okay. He’ll be our backup. Whether he knows it or not. This goes south, my ass will definitely be on the line. I’ll have to bribe him with a dinner date or something.”
Cool, I thought. Neat. If this goes south, I’ll probably be dead.
She put the car back in drive and pulled out of the lot. The time for talking was done. We were moving toward the point of no return, and the word ‘bananas‘ was ringing in my ears. A cruel echo of the trust I’d just shattered.
But as the city fell away behind us, turning into industrial parks and abandoned warehouses, I let resolve settle over me like
a coat of armor.
There was no turning back now. The path was set. I would end this, or it would end me.
The guilt was still a sickening knot in my stomach, but it was being slowly encased in ice. Frozen solid by the necessity of whatever came next.
C
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Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.
