Echoes in the Dark

CHAPTER 7 - Shadows Between Us

Adrian’s apartment was nothing like Mara had expected.

She had pictured bare walls, a couch that doubled as a bed, maybe a stack of takeout boxes in the corner. Instead, it was clean. Almost too clean. Every surface in the living room gleamed under soft amber lighting, furniture arranged with military precision.

The only thing out of place was a framed photograph on the bookshelf which contained two men in uniform, standing shoulder to shoulder in front of a dusty military jeep. Adrian and another man she didn’t recognize. The edges of the photo were worn, as if it had been handled often.

She didn’t ask. Not yet.

“You can take the bedroom,” Adrian said, tossing his keys in a dish near the door. “I’ll take the couch.”

“I’m fine with the couch,” Mara replied.

“Not up for debate.” His tone made it clear he wasn’t budging.

She rolled her eyes but walked toward the hall. The bedroom was as spare as the rest of the apartment—dark gray walls, a neatly made bed, no personal touches except for a single old watch on the dresser. A man’s watch, the leather strap cracked from years of wear.

Mara brushed her fingers over it, feeling the faint chill of the metal. Something about this place felt heavy. Not oppressive, but weighted like every object had a story she wasn’t allowed to read yet.

Later, over reheated leftovers, they went over the case again. The Dealer. The Greystone Syndicate. Eddie’s cryptic comment about “extraction.”

Mara tapped her fork against her plate. “You think they’re experimenting with something?”

Adrian leaned back in his chair. “If they’re not selling organs, and it’s something in the blood… maybe it’s chemical. Biological. Could be they’re harvesting something rare. Or testing it.”

“That’s… not comforting.”

“It’s not supposed to be.”

She caught the flicker of something in his eyes then—tired, but sharp, the look of a man who had already connected dots but didn’t like the picture they made.

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It was close to midnight when the knock came.

Three slow, deliberate raps.

Adrian froze mid-step.

“Stay here,” he whispered, sliding his pistol from the small of his back.

Mara’s throat tightened as she heard the door open just enough for voices—low, tense. She caught only fragments:

“…shouldn’t be here…”

“…just a message…”

“…tell her to stop looking…”

The door shut harder than necessary. Adrian reappeared, jaw clenched. He dropped a single playing card onto the coffee table—king of spades.

It wasn’t just the Dealer’s calling card.

On the back, written in cramped, uneven ink, was a single address.

Mara stared at it. “Is this… where they want us to go?”

“Or where they want us to die,” Adrian said flatly.

They sat in silence for a long moment, the city’s distant hum pressing against the windows. Mara realized then that for all of Adrian’s control, his hands were not entirely steady.

“You’ve seen this before,” she said quietly.

He didn’t answer right away. “Yeah. Different city. Different case. My partner didn’t walk away from it.”

That explained the photo on the shelf. The weight in this place. The guarded way he looked at her, like she was already halfway to becoming another ghost in his history.

When they finally settled for the night, Adrian took the couch, claiming he didn’t sleep much anyway. Mara lay in the bedroom staring at the ceiling, hearing every sound—the creak of old pipes, the muffled hum of a passing car, the almost imperceptible shift of someone else awake in the next room.

The card with the address burned in her mind.

And somewhere in the city, she knew someone was waiting for them to make the next move.