Chapter 4 - The Safehouse on Tenth Street
The safehouse was a nondescript, single-story brick building tucked behind an auto-repair shop on Tenth Street, smelling faintly of motor oil and old dust. The windows were heavily barred, and the single heavy wooden door was reinforced with a steel deadlock.
Delaney dropped her wet backpack onto a scarred wooden table and turned on Cassian, who was busy disinfecting a deep, purpling bruise across his ribs with a bottle of cheap antiseptic.
"This is insane," Delaney said, pacing the narrow length of the room. "You brought us to a garage in the middle of a war zone. Raldi’s men are looking for you, Branigan is looking for me, and the entire city police department is probably on high alert after that warehouse fire."
Cassian winced as he applied the antiseptic, but his eyes remained steady. "Branigan is an honest cop. That’s our only saving grace in this precinct. But you're right about Raldi—he has deep roots. If we go to the regular authorities with just this drive, it will get 'lost' in an evidence locker before the sun sets tomorrow."
"Then what do we do?" Delaney demanded, walking up to him. "Just sit here and wait for them to kick the door down?"
Cassian stopped, looking at her with a strange intensity. For the first time, he seemed to properly evaluate the young woman standing before him—the student nurse who had dragged his half-suffocated body out of a shallow grave without a second thought.
"We don't wait," Cassian said softly. "We use the system against them. But to do that, we need to understand why Raldi was willing to kill his own chief auditor over Larkin Row."
Delaney crossed her arms, her jaw tightening. "It's real estate development. They want the land. They want luxury apartments and high-rises."
"No," Cassian corrected, tossing the cotton ball onto the table. "That’s the cover story. Larkin Row sits on top of something much more valuable than commercial real estate. Ten years ago, the city approved a massive environmental cleanup grant for the river basin. Raldi’s firm embezzled eighty percent of those funds, pocketed the cash, and left the soil contaminated with industrial waste. Your mother, Nell... her kidneys didn't fail just from natural causes. The water table in Larkin Row was poisoned."
The words hit Delaney like a physical blow. The room seemed to tilt on its axis.
"Poisoned," Delaney whispered, her voice cracking. "My mother... she lived there for twelve years."
"Raldi knew the audit was coming because I uncovered the environmental lab reports hidden in the municipal archives," Cassian continued, his voice dropping into a hard, cold register. "If those reports go public, Raldi Development collapses overnight, and criminal indictments follow for half the state legislature. That’s why he had to bury me. And that’s why you’re a target now too, Delaney. You saw his face. You heard his voice."
A heavy silence fell over the safehouse. The anger that had been simmering inside Delaney since her mother’s death suddenly crystallized into something clear, cold, and absolute. There was no more fear left—only an overwhelming, burning need for justice.
"Show me the drive," Delaney said quietly.
Cassian raised an eyebrow. "It’s encrypted. Military-grade PGP."
"I spent three years studying pharmacology and medical databases. I know how to parse complex data structures," Delaney replied, pulling her old notebook and penlight from her backpack. "Show me the files."
Cassian stared at her for a second, then gave a slow, approving nod. He walked over to a battered laptop sitting on the desk, plugged in the thumb drive, and entered a twenty-character passphrase.
May you like
As the files decrypted on the screen, lines of green text illuminated their faces. But before they could even read the first document, a sharp, metallic click echoed from the heavy front door.
Someone was picking the lock.
