The fog rolling off the dark waters of the Atlantic was thick, carrying the bitter, metallic scent of brine and industrial decay. Pier 44 was a desolate graveyard of rusted shipping containers and rotting timber, a place where the city's forgotten sins were swallowed by the tide. The dawn had barely begun to bleed a bruised, violet light into the eastern sky, casting long, fractured shadows across the wet concrete.
I stood in the center of the pier, the kinetic-weave tactical suit absorbing the faint ambient light, rendering me little more than a silhouette against the mist. The twin tungsten-carbide blades rested in their sheaths against my thighs, cold and heavy with anticipation.
Fifty yards away, standing beneath the flickering halo of a dying halogen streetlamp, was Silas.
He looke
