Chapter 3 - Shadows in the Suburbs
Tracking an operative of Trent’s caliber—or someone hiding under a state-sponsored alias provided by the Holloway network—was nearly impossible for an ordinary man. But I wasn't ordinary, and I knew the ghosts that haunted my uncle's secret ledgers.
By 3:00 AM, using an encrypted tracking frequency embedded in the VIN of the black sedan from the photograph, I had a general location: a quiet, middle-class residential pocket in the old maple district across town. It was an area of modest, single-story homes with overgrown lawns and peeling paint—a far cry from the gated high-rises and pristine waterfront estates where the Holloways usually operated.
I parked my car three blocks away, cutting the lights and the engine, letting the chassis cool in the damp autumn air. The neighborhood was dead silent save for the occasional rustle of dry leaves blowing across the asphalt.
Walking through the shadows, my hand resting comfortably on the cold steel of the Sig Sauer tucked into my waistband, I felt like a stranger invading a life that should have belonged to me.
Number 42 Elmwood Lane was a modest, unassuming cottage with a wrap-around porch and a single yellow light burning dimly behind a lace curtain in the front window. A rusted station wagon sat in the narrow driveway—a vehicle entirely uncharacteristic of anyone connected to Desmond Holloway's deep pockets.
I crept up the gravel walkway, keeping low beneath the low-hanging branches of a sprawling oak tree. The heavy scent of rain-soaked earth and blooming night jasmine filled the air, sharply contrasting with the heavy, metallic taste of adrenaline in my mouth.
I peered through the side window, shielding my eyes from the ambient streetlamp.
Jolene was inside.
She was sitting at a small laminate kitchen table, wearing an oversized flannel shirt, carefully sorting through a stack of handwritten documents. Her hair, usually tied back neatly during our days in the city, fell in loose, wavy dark strands over her shoulders. She looked tired—her face paler than I remembered, dark circles bruised beneath her eyes, bearing the unmistakable physical toll of a woman carrying a child entirely on her own.
As I watched her rub her lower back with a grimace of pain, a sharp pang of conflicting emotion threatened to destabilize my resolve. She's suffering, a traitorous voice whispered in the back of my mind. Maybe Desmond forced her out. Maybe she had no choice.
Then I remembered the photograph: Jolene standing beside my uncle, calmly handing him paperwork, willingly stepping into that black sedan. No gun to her head. No visible duress. Just a cold, calculated transaction.
I didn't knock. I bypassed the front door entirely, slipping around to the side entrance where a weak wooden latch secured the kitchen screen door. With a single, calculated flex of my fingers, the latch splintered silently, and I stepped across the threshold into the warm, quiet house.
The floorboard groaned beneath my shoe.
Jolene froze instantly. The pen slipped from her fingers, clattering softly against the laminate table. She didn't turn around right away; instead, her shoulders stiffened, her breath catching in her throat as her eyes fixed on the reflection in the dark kitchen windowpane.
"I told Desmond I wouldn't stay within city limits," her voice came out low, shaking, yet remarkably steady for a woman cornered in the dead of night. "I honored our agreement. You have no right to be here, Grant."
May you like
The sound of my name rolling off her tongue after five months of agonizing silence felt like a physical blow. I stepped out of the shadows, closing the distance between us until the cold kitchen island separated us by barely three feet.
"My name," I rasped, my voice sounding like gravel grinding over steel, "is the only real thing left in this entire room, Jolene. Care to explain why you gave it up?"
