ledger and light

chapter eleven

Tessa was in the back, hunched over the laptop, fingers flying. Claire drove hard through the empty east-side streets, Adrian in the passenger seat watching the rearview mirror like it owed him money. No one was following. Not yet.

“Drive normal,” Tessa muttered without looking up. “If Dela Cruz’s guys are out, they’re looking for a car that’s running.”

Claire eased off the gas. “You’re welcome for not getting shot, by the way.”

“You’re welcome for getting us the drive,” Tessa shot back. Then, quieter: “Thanks. Both of you.”

Adrian glanced at her in the mirror. “You okay?”

“Fine. Kiko’s cousin tried to flirt. I told him I’d brick his phone if he didn’t back up.” A pause. “He backed up.”

Claire’s mouth twitched. That was the closest Tessa got to a joke when she was shaken.

Adrian let out a low breath. “Good. Because if he’d touched you, Kiko wouldn’t have been the one I talked to next.”

Tessa stilled for half a second. “You didn’t have to say that.”

“No,” Adrian said. “But I meant it.”

Claire kept her eyes on the road. She heard the shift in the car anyway. Less like coworkers, more like people who’d decided they weren’t leaving each other behind.

The safehouse was dark when they got there. Tessa killed the lights on the laptop, pulled the backup drive, and plugged it into the offline tower in the back room.

“Giving this to the main system is how we get traced,” she said. “So we’re doing it old-school. Air-gapped.”

Claire locked the door behind them. “What’s on it?”

Tessa opened the file. The screen filled with schedules, routes, names. Not just shipments. Times, drivers, bribes. Enough to make Dela Cruz’s whole operation stutter.

“Full manifest for the next two weeks,” Tessa said. “And…” She scrolled. Stopped.

Her face went hard.

“What?” Adrian asked.

“Pier 9. Tomorrow night. 01:00.” Tessa looked up at Claire. “They’re moving something big. And it’s not product.”

Claire frowned. “What then?”

“People,” Tessa said. “Dela Cruz is running a transfer. Off the books, off the radar. If we don’t stop it, twenty-three people vanish before sunrise.”

The room went quiet.

Adrian exhaled through his nose. “That’s why he wanted us off Pier 12. Too many eyes. Pier 9 is dead at night.”

Claire’s jaw tightened. She’d chased money and proof for months. This was different.

“We stop it,” she said.

Tessa nodded. “I can reroute the gate logs, give us a five-minute window. But we’ll be inside before backup arrives. If it arrives.”

Adrian checked his sidearm, then set it down. “No guns unless we have to. If we make this loud, Dela Cruz buries it and the people with it.”

Claire looked at him. Really looked. Two days ago he’d been a liability. Now he was the one thinking about keeping it clean.

“Since when are you the restraint?” she asked.

“Since I realized I’d rather have you mad at me than dead,” Adrian said, matter-of-fact.

Tessa coughed into her hand. Claire ignored her.

“Fine,” Claire said. “We go in quiet. You handle the gate, Tessa. Adrian and I move the people out.”

Adrian nodded. Then, after a beat: “And Claire? If it goes bad, you run. Don’t try to play hero.”

Claire held his gaze. “If it goes bad, we all run. Together.”

Something in his expression shifted. Not softer, exactly. More certain. Like he’d been waiting for her to say that.

Tessa cleared her throat loudly. “Okay, romance later. Pier 9 in eight hours. I need sleep, coffee, and for neither of you to get shot.”

Adrian almost smiled. “No promises.”

Claire killed the main light. The glow of the laptop was the only thing left, casting their faces in blue.

Outside, the city was quiet again. For now.