Echoes in the Dark

CHAPTER 3- The First Move

The image burned into Adrian’s mind long after the phone screen went dark.

It wasn’t just the card.

It was the reflection.

They were watching him close enough to catch his face without him noticing. That meant eyes—possibly cameras—had been on him for hours, maybe longer.

He slipped the phone back into his pocket, careful not to let Mara see the tremor in his fingers.

“We’re done here,” he told her.

“Done?” She straightened, brows narrowing. “We barely—”

“Trust me.” He was already walking out of the building, leaving Beck blinking in the doorway.

Outside, the cold air hit like a slap, but it didn’t clear his head. He scanned the street—every window, every parked car, every camera on a lamppost felt like a potential set of eyes.

Mara caught up, matching his pace. “You’re acting like someone just put a gun to your head.”

He didn’t answer. The less she knew, the safer she’d be—at least for now.

Back at the precinct, the captain called them into his office. Captain Ross was a square-shouldered man with the patience of a caffeine-deprived saint. His desk was stacked with case files like leaning towers.

“I’m moving you two onto this full-time,” Ross said. “Denton’s death is officially a priority. The mayor’s office is sniffing around.”

“That means?” Mara asked.

“That means somebody important is nervous. And when they’re nervous, I’m nervous.” Ross eyed Adrian. “Whatever ghosts you’ve got rattling in this case, Cross, keep them in check. I don’t need you going rogue.”

Adrian bit back the urge to laugh. Going rogue was the only reason this case ever moved forward last time. But he nodded.

“Good. Now get out of my office.”

---

Hours later, they were buried in the evidence room. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting a pale glow on metal shelving stacked with boxes. Mara sat at a long table, Denton’s personal effects spread before her like a dissected body: his watch, wallet, house keys, a stack of notebooks.

She flipped through one, pausing at a page near the back. “This is weird.”

Adrian leaned in. The handwriting was cramped and frantic, as if Denton had been writing fast. The words weren’t full sentences—just fragments:

Black Sun… Yards… 11:47… Watchers… 7130.

Mara tapped the last number. “Could be a code. Or an address.”

“Or both.”

Before they could dig deeper, Adrian’s phone rang. The caller ID showed Private.

He hesitated, then answered. “Cross.”

A woman’s voice this time—low, urgent. “If you want to live, don’t go to the yards.”

The line went dead.

---

9:43 PM — Black Sun Freight Yards

Adrian was there anyway.

The yards stretched like a steel graveyard under the moonlight, shipping containers stacked in towering rows. The air smelled faintly of rust and diesel. Mara trailed behind him, her flashlight slicing through the shadows.

“You do realize this is the exact opposite of what that mystery caller told you?” she whispered.

“Which is exactly why we’re here,” Adrian murmured. “If someone’s willing to warn me off, it means they’re hiding something.”

They moved deeper between the containers until Mara stopped abruptly, her beam catching something on the ground.

A body.

The man’s throat was slit, eyes wide in a frozen expression of terror. In his stiffened hand was a crumpled photograph—a blurry shot of Adrian and Mara standing outside Ferris & Cole earlier that day.

“Jesus,” Mara breathed.

From somewhere in the darkness, a metallic clang echoed—footsteps on steel.

Adrian pulled his gun. “We’re not alone.”

A shadow moved at the far end of the aisle between containers. Tall. Fast. Gone before he could shout.

Mara crouched beside the body. “This wasn’t random. This was a message.”

The wind shifted, carrying the faint sound of something scraping against metal.

Adrian turned, and his blood ran cold.

Dangling from the side of a container, swinging gently in the night breeze, was another king of spades.

Pinned to it, by a single knife, was a strip of paper with four words in red ink:

WE’RE NOT FINISHED YET.