Chapter 7 - The Detective’s Secret
The force of the blast knocked everyone to the ground.
Hayes fired once.
The bullet passed over Reed’s shoulder and struck a man dressed as a firefighter behind him. A suppressed pistol fell from the man’s hand.
He had been aiming at Reed.
Hayes had saved him.
Two more false firefighters ran from the smoke. Federal agents pursued them through the lobby.
Hayes lowered her weapon.
“You might want to stop staring at me and get outside.”
We carried Marco from the building seconds before part of the roof collapsed.
Across the street, Hayes removed a small device from beneath her collar.
“A body camera,” Anthony said.
“Always.”
Reed looked at the flash drive. “Your reflection is in that editing room.”
“Yes.”
“Explain.”
Hayes leaned against an ambulance.
“Three years ago, Grayson ordered me to create false evidence against Dominic.”
I stepped closer.
“What evidence?”
“A recording that would connect you to Carlo’s murder. I refused to submit it.”
“But you made it.”
“I needed Grayson to believe I was cooperating while I copied his files.”
“Why did you never tell me?”
“Because you were still running a criminal organization, and I did not trust you.”
“That has never stopped you from accusing me.”
“It stopped me from giving you evidence that could expose undercover agents.”
Reed crossed his arms. “Where are the copied files?”
Hayes looked toward the burning bank.
“Gone. My apartment was burglarized six months ago.”
Marco sat on the ambulance step.
“Then the flash drive was planted to divide us.”
“Exactly,” Hayes said.
Someone wanted me to distrust her, Anthony to distrust me, and Marco to believe I had ordered Carlo’s death.
Salvatore’s conspiracy survived by turning allies against one another.
My phone rang.
The hospital.
Bruno had disappeared.
Mateo explained that a maintenance worker opened a restricted stairwell. Bruno caught a scent and ran down twelve floors. Security cameras showed him leaving through the loading dock.
Elena remained safe.
“Why would he leave her?” Anthony asked.
“He would not,” I said. “Unless he believed the threat was already moving away.”
We reviewed the loading-dock footage.
A white van exited seconds before Bruno.
The driver’s face was hidden, but a passenger turned toward the window.
Salvatore.
He had escaped federal custody.
Reed cursed.
“How?”
Hayes checked her messages.
“A transport order was entered under my credentials.”
The conspiracy had used her stolen access again.
Bruno was following Salvatore.
We traced the dog’s harness until the signal stopped near an industrial district in the Bronx.
The location was an abandoned animal shelter.
Inside, cages lined the walls.
Most were empty.
From the rear room came a dog’s bark.
Bruno.
We entered carefully.
He stood behind a steel gate, unharmed but trapped.
A recorded voice played through speakers.
“Loyalty is such an easy weakness to exploit.”
Salvatore.
Bruno had followed his scent into the building, where an automatic gate closed behind him.
I opened the cage.
Bruno rushed past me toward a pile of blankets.
Beneath them lay a teenage boy.
Unconscious.
Mercer’s son.
A note was pinned to his shirt.
THE DOCTOR TALKS, THE BOY DIES.
The boy was alive but had an IV line in his arm.
Mercer examined him.
“It is the same drug given to Elena.”
The dose was higher.
We had minutes.
Mercer administered a reversal agent from his medical kit while Bruno licked the boy’s face.
The teenager gasped and opened his eyes.
“Dad?”
Mercer held him.
For the first time, the doctor’s composure broke.
After paramedics arrived, the boy told us he had been held in several locations. The last was beneath a train station.
“Did you see anyone?” Reed asked.
“A woman called Judge.”
“Was that her name?”
“I don’t know. Everyone listened to her.”
He described a woman in her sixties with red glasses and a burn scar along her neck.
Hayes recognized her.
“Federal Judge Margaret Vale.”
Vale had signed sealed warrants connected to Harbor Light and dismissed multiple corruption cases involving Salvatore’s associates.
She was not merely protecting the Lantern Council.
She was leading it.
That evening, Judge Vale appeared on television.
She announced an emergency hearing into federal misconduct surrounding my case. She accused Reed and Hayes of assisting organized crime and ordered warrants for their arrest.
Then she addressed me directly.
“Dominic Moretti represents a violent system that has terrorized this city for decades. Anyone helping him will be prosecuted.”
She was right about what I had represented.
That made her lie more powerful.
“Grand Central,” Mercer said. “The council meets tonight.”
Reed shook his head. “Every agency will be searching for us.”
“That is why they chose tonight,” Hayes replied.
We entered the terminal through an abandoned mail tunnel shortly before midnight.
Marco remained behind with Mercer and his son. Anthony came despite my orders.
“You cannot keep protecting me by leaving me in safe rooms,” he said.
The tunnel led to a platform closed since the 1940s.
A black train waited on the tracks.
Inside, figures sat behind frosted glass partitions.
Judge Vale stood at the front.
Salvatore sat beside her, his hospital gown hidden beneath an overcoat.
Grayson occupied another seat despite supposedly being in federal custody.
The Lantern Council had extracted both men.
Vale spoke.
“Project Lantern is compromised. We begin evacuation immediately.”
A screen behind her showed bank accounts, passports, and lists of witnesses.
One name appeared at the top.
ELENA VASQUEZ.
Beside it:
TERMINATION BEFORE DAWN.
Anthony raised his weapon.
I stopped him.
“We need all of them alive.”
Hayes began recording.
Reed transmitted the feed to a secure federal server.
Then Salvatore looked directly toward the tunnel where we hid.
“I told you Dominic would come.”
Lights flooded our position.
Armed guards surrounded us from behind.
Judge Vale smiled.
“Bring them aboard.”
May you like
We had not discovered the council’s meeting.
The council had used Elena’s name to bring us into its trap.
