Chapter 8 - The Dead Track Where a Trusted Man Betrayed Us

Track Nine had not carried passengers in twenty years.

It ran behind an abandoned produce warehouse on the eastern edge of Hawthorne Junction, where weeds grew between the rails and rust had eaten the signal posts hollow.

At 11:53, Cece stood inside the warehouse wearing a wire Claire insisted was off the official police network.

Max hated the plan.

He had said so eleven times.

“You are not walking out there alone.”

“The message was sent to me.”

“That is not an argument.”

“It’s literally why they’ll expect me.”

Marcus checked the side door.

Claire adjusted the receiver at her belt.

Sofia remained at the safe house under guard. Dale had been sent home with two of Max’s men after threatening to hit someone with a wrench if they called him elderly.

Cece looked at Max.

“If Eleanor is alive, every minute matters.”

His voice lowered.

“And if they take you?”

“Then you’ll do something unreasonable.”

“That is not comforting.”

“It wasn’t meant to be.”

She picked up a canvas bag containing copies of the ledgers.

The originals were locked elsewhere.

At midnight, a lantern appeared beside the tracks.

Cece walked toward it.

Cold air cut through her coat. The station district was quiet enough that she could hear her own shoes on gravel.

A man stepped from behind a freight car.

Not Vittorio.

Nico Bellandi.

Cece knew him as one of Max’s younger lieutenants, broad-shouldered, polite, always carrying peppermint gum.

Max had trusted him enough to guard Sofia that afternoon.

Cece’s stomach dropped.

“Nico.”

He looked embarrassed.

“Ms. Rowan.”

“You’re the leak.”

His jaw tightened. “Put the bag down.”

“Where is Eleanor?”

“Alive.”

“Show me.”

He lifted his phone.

A video call connected.

Eleanor Vale sat bound in what looked like an office, a bruise along one cheek.

“Cece?” the older woman said.

“I’m here.”

“Don’t give them anything.”

A hand struck Eleanor from outside the frame.

Cece flinched.

Nico lowered the phone.

“The bag.”

She placed it on the gravel.

“Why?”

Nico’s eyes moved toward the warehouse.

“You really want to know?”

“Yes.”

“My father owed Vittorio. I inherited the debt.”

“That’s not loyalty.”

“No.”

“Then stop.”

His laugh was bitter.

“You think men like Vittorio let people stop?”

A train horn sounded in the distance.

Cece frowned.

No trains were scheduled on this spur.

Nico heard it too.

His face changed.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen.”

The rails began to hum.

From the darkness behind him, an engine light appeared.

Max’s voice exploded through Cece’s earpiece.

“MOVE.”

Nico grabbed her.

They fell behind a concrete signal box as a maintenance locomotive thundered past on the dead track.

Someone had restored the switch.

The canvas bag vanished beneath the wheels.

Copies of Thomas’s ledgers became white scraps in the wind.

Gunfire cracked from the warehouse.

Nico pulled a pistol.

Cece kicked his wrist.

The gun skidded away.

He stared at her in surprise.

“My father taught me self-defense after a man followed me home from college.”

“You could’ve mentioned that.”

“You never asked.”

Max reached them seconds later.

He slammed Nico against the signal box.

Marcus arrived with two men.

“Where is Eleanor?” Max demanded.

Nico spat blood.

“Go to hell.”

Max drew back his fist.

Cece caught his arm.

“Don’t.”

“He tried to kill you.”

“Then beating him unconscious won’t tell us where she is.”

Max’s eyes were black with rage.

For one dangerous second, she did not know whether he would listen.

Then he released Nico.

Claire joined them.

“Nico Bellandi, you can talk to me now or explain yourself to whichever investigator gets bought first.”

Nico laughed.

“You really think your father won’t bury this?”

Claire crouched in front of him.

“I think he spent my entire life assuming I was too afraid of him to choose a side.”

Something in her voice changed Nico’s expression.

He looked toward Cece.

“Eleanor is at the old Orchard packing plant.”

Marcus frowned. “That place burned.”

“Front building did. Cold-storage wing is intact.”

Cece remembered Thomas’s folder.

HJ-ORCHARD.

Max did too.

Nico continued.

“Vittorio wanted the ledgers. Rusk wants Eleanor dead.”

“Why?” Claire asked.

Nico swallowed.

“Because she saw him kill Arturo Corvelli.”

Max became perfectly still.

The recording had captured a gunshot, but not the shooter.

Eleanor had seen it.

Claire stood.

“We move now.”

Nico laughed again, weaker this time.

“You’re already late.”

Max grabbed his coat.

“What does that mean?”

“Vittorio knows the ledgers were copies.”

Cece’s blood turned cold.

Nico looked directly at her.

“He knows where the originals are because someone told him about the safe house.”

Max looked at Marcus.

Marcus looked toward the road.

Then all three phones rang at once.

The safe house alarm.

Sofia was there.

Max answered.

Static.

Then Sofia’s voice, breathless and terrified.

“Max, don’t come back. They’re inside.”

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A crash.

The call ended.