Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 90511 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 453(@200wpm)___ 362(@250wpm)___ 302(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90511 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 453(@200wpm)___ 362(@250wpm)___ 302(@300wpm)
I’ve been around this game for too long. I’ve seen relationships crash and burn a thousand different times. I’m too old for Charlie and I’m way outside of her league. She’s from one of the oldest, richest families in the area, and I’m just some kid with a violent past and a vendetta against the world. I hurt all the fucking time, and all I ever want to do is fight.
She’s good. I’m rotten. There’s no getting past the truth.
No matter how much she makes me feel, our relationship is doomed to failure.
I’m in a bleak mood when I arrive at the depot. Davide’s waiting for me out front, which is a rarity. He’s a big guy, dark hair, dark eyes, and in good shape. Whenever I mention my tech guy, people always picture some skinny string-bean dork, but that’s not Davide. He approaches his physical fitness with the same level of obsessive devotion as he does everything else in his life.
He just doesn’t really like people.
I asked him about that once. He only shrugged and said, computers make more sense.
Couldn’t argue with that.
“What’s the story?” I ask him, skipping the handshake. He’ll do it, but I know he doesn’t like it.
“We’re not totally sure what happened yet,” he admits, scrubbing the back of his head as we walk out into the trucking yard. “The cameras all went out at the same time right at one-thirty in the morning. The motion sensors caught someone walking through the yard, which triggered the new alarms I set up. That scared them off, from what I can tell. The cameras came back a few minutes later.”
I stare grimly around us. “You’re telling me someone hacked your security?”
“It doesn’t feel good to admit, but that’s how it looks.”
“Well, shit. Never thought I’d see the day.”
“There’s more.” He leads me to one of the back fence gates. It’s an enormous thing, two-layered, and wrapped in more barbed wire than a prison. This portion of the fence is essentially impenetrable. “They came in through here.”
I raise my eyebrows and look at him. “Seriously?”
“They had a keycard.” He motions to the side employee entrance. It’s just a smaller door in the fence made from reinforced steel with a scanner entry. “Giorgio’s name shows up in the logs.”
I let that sink in. Giorgio’s one of my most loyal and dependable employees. I can’t imagine he showed up in the middle of the night unless he had work to do. And even then, he wouldn’t run off if the security triggered. He’d stick around and fix shit.
“I want to talk to him.”
“He’s on the way in now, but he already swore up and down he’s been at home all night. I hacked his phone and his GPS data suggests he’s not lying.”
“Then what? Someone stole his card?”
“Or spoofed his identity. That’s possible too. Whoever we’re dealing with is sophisticated.”
I glare at the fence before stomping back to the depot. “I don’t like this. First those transmitters and now this. Someone’s targeting us, and I want to know why.”
“There’s one more thing, speaking of the transmitters. I finally managed to locate where they’ve been uploading to.”
I stop outside the depot entrance. “You gonna keep teasing me all night or are you gonna make the first move?”
He gives me a tired look. “It’s somewhere in the suburbs, out near Radnor.”
“That’s rich people territory. Can you be more specific?”
“Wish I could, but that’s the best I got.”
I let that sink in, trying to figure out who the hell in Radnor would want to fuck with my trucking depot. It’s not a long list.
Right now there are exactly zero names on it.
“Keep digging. We need to find these bastards and put a stop to this.”
Davide nods and walks off, probably heading back to his cave. I linger in the main repair section of the depot, looking at a few trucks getting refitted for long routes.
Who would want to break into this place? And who would care about our trucking routes? If I were a paranoid man, I’d think it was the Feds trying to sniff out our smuggling operation. But we’ve got enough of their number on our payroll. That shouldn’t be an issue.
I can’t put it together. But I can feel the problem circling around me like hungry wolves.
I reach my office, put my feet up on my desk, and glare at the clock. Charlie’s fast asleep right now, curled up under the sheets, all alone.
I should be there with her.
Not in this fucking place.
But I have a job to do, and even if my wife’s a big distraction, I can’t afford to give in to temptation.
It’s going to be another late night and long day.
Nobody knows a goddamn thing.
That’s my only takeaway from four hours of hanging around the depot talking to Giorgio and all his guys.