Chapter 5 - HIS NAME WAS IN THE KILL FILE
I slapped him.
Hard.
Eli didn’t move.
“You were assigned to me?”
“Yes.”
“To protect me?”
“No.”
My stomach turned.
The train clattered under us.
“Then what?”
“To watch you.”
“For Mercy?”
“Yes.”
I raised the gun I had taken at the temple.
He looked at it, then at me.
“You should take the safety off.”
I looked down.
He knocked the gun from my hand.
It bounced off the metal platform and disappeared under the train.
I screamed, “You son of a—”
“Now you can hate me without shooting your own foot.”
“Get away from me.”
“There’s nowhere to go.”
“Try.”
He turned his back and climbed to the next platform.
That somehow made me angrier.
We rode three miles in silence before jumping off near downtown.
The private vault sat under an old insurance building with no sign and no public entrance. Eli used a side stairwell and a code.
“Still work here too?” I asked.
“No.”
The lock clicked open.
“Then why does your code work?”
He didn’t answer.
Of course.
Inside, an elderly clerk sat behind bulletproof glass reading a newspaper.
He looked at me once, then at the locket.
“Box 317,” he said.
“You know me?”
“No.”
“You didn’t ask my name.”
“Didn’t need it.”
He slid a tray through the slot.
There was a second lock inside.
My metal key fit perfectly.
Box 317 contained no money.
No jewelry.
Just a black notebook and a flash drive.
I opened the notebook.
Pages of names.
Judges. Doctors. Police captains. Pastors. Contractors. Reporters.
Beside every name was a number and a word.
PAID.
CONTROLLED.
MISSING.
DEAD.
I stopped on a name I recognized.
Dr. Amelia Grant.
My mother’s oncologist.
Beside her name: CONTROLLED.
My hand went cold.
“Mom died of cancer.”
Eli said nothing.
I turned another page.
There was my father.
DAVID REED — SYSTEM ARCHITECT — DECEASED.
Then Noah.
NOAH REED — RAVEN — ACTIVE.
I pressed my finger to the word.
“Active.”
Eli leaned closer.
His face changed.
“What?”
“That entry wasn’t there before.”
“You’ve seen this book?”
“Seven years ago.”
“You said Noah died protecting it.”
“I said he died trying to protect what was in the box.”
“Stop playing with words!”
The clerk suddenly stood up behind the glass.
His newspaper dropped.
A red dot appeared on his chest.
Eli yelled, “DOWN!”
The glass exploded.
The clerk fell backward.
I hit the floor.
Eli dragged me behind the counter as bullets tore through the lobby.
Three masked men entered through the front.
One shouted, “Take the key alive!”
“Not the girl?” I whispered.
Eli heard it too.
His eyes narrowed.
He pulled a backup pistol from an ankle holster.
“You had another gun?”
“I have trust issues.”
“I wonder why.”
He fired twice.
The nearest attacker dropped behind a chair.
I grabbed the notebook and flash drive.
The clerk coughed behind us.
He was alive.
I crawled to him.
He grabbed my collar with bloody fingers.
“Your mother,” he whispered.
“What about her?”
“Room Nine.”
“Where?”
He tried to speak again.
A shot punched through the counter.
His hand fell away.
I stared at him.
Eli pulled me toward the back stairs.
“Move!”
As we ran, I looked down at the ledger one more time.
A line had been added beneath my name in fresh black ink.
TRANSFER TO WARD.
And beside it was today’s date.
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