ONE
Ridge
The Warehouse District:Situated between the French Quarter and the Mississippi River, it blends its 19th-century industrial roots with modern revitalization, featuring art galleries, luxury apartments, and trendy restaurants. In its shadowed corners, crime and homelessness persist, creating dangerous pockets where businesses shutter, and the city’s darker underbelly thrives.
Wells and Kellerare trading laughs across the table, loud enough to carry over the clinking of glasses and the low hum of the bar. They’ve always been better at unwinding than I am.
I swirl the bourbon in my glass, my thoughts nowhere near the bar. Being the oldest of six brothers means I’m already in the business, already carrying weight, already expected to take over one day, whether I want that responsibility or not.
Unlike the others, I don’t get to shut it off. While theydrink, I’m still tracking shipments, schedules, bottlenecks. I’ve spent years at my father’s side, absorbing how Stone Intermodal actually runs, stepping in when he steps away, making decisions that don’t wait for tomorrow.
My father named me Executive Vice President two years ago, but the title barely matters. What matters is that I’m the one who sits beside him, learning how decisions ripple through the ports, how one delay turns into ten, how mistakes don’t stay contained.
I don’t inherit it someday. I’m already living with it.
Most of the family does something adjacent to the import/export business. But I’m the one who works closest with our father and understands how our ports actually function. I know customs schedules, labor contracts, inspections, and the pressure points no one outside the business ever sees.
Tonight should be lighter. Rarely do I get a stolen hour in a bar with several of my brothers. But it doesn’t.
My phone buzzes against the table, cutting through the haze. The number on the screen is blocked.
I typically answer “Unknown Number.” But something makes me press the green button tonight.
“Yeah?” My tone is flat and neutral.
At first, there’s only static. It’s just enough to put me on edge. A low, distorted voice cuts through the static. “701 Poydras. Come alone. Now.”
The line clicks dead.
I stare at the phone as the hairs on my neck rise. I know the location. It’s an abandoned warehouse we own but lease to Gulf Meridian Imports, a smaller logistics company that runs shipments through us from time to time.
“Everything good?” Wells’s voice cuts through, casual, but his eyes are sharp.
I slip the phone into my pocket, schooling my expression and down the rest of my drink.
“Yeah,” I lie, standing. “Just a quick thing to check out.”
Wells raises a brow, but I don’t offer more. Whatever this is, no need to pull everyone in until I know what it’s about.
“Back soon,” I say over my shoulder.
They go back to their drinks as I step outside. My hand is already in my pocket by the time I reach my car.
Whoever called knew how to find me. That narrows the list fast.
The street is still.It’s the kind of quiet that’s all wrong, like the city’s holding its breath.
A few cars sit parked along the side of the road with clouded windows from the night’s chill. Behind me, the faint notes of a brass band fade away, the saxophone lingering a second longer before disappearing between the buildings.
The silence that follows is almost too loud.
Fog rolls off the river, clinging low to the cracked asphalt around my tires. Dank, brisk air seeps through the cracked window.
I ease the car to the curb and kill the headlights, letting the darkness shroud me. For a second, I just sit there, scanning the dead street. The only sound is the low mechanical whir as I roll the window up.
Who the fuck called me, and why the secrecy?
The buildings loom beside me, their edges softened by the mist in the air. No traffic, no lights, not even a shadowof movement. Just rows of abandoned warehouses disappearing into the dark.
