He does as I say.
Matteo's breath comes uneven as he looks to the bottom corner of a manifest sheet. There's a stamp pressed into the paper—faint,oily black ink spreading outward like someone spilled it. It looks like smoke drifting across water, tendrils swallowing light.
"He marks his contracts with it. No name. Always only this."
The mark looks alive, like it's still moving under the paper, tainting everything it touches.
"That's how you identify his work?"
Matteo nods. "It means the cargo belongs to him. That's all we ever know."
"And you move whatever he wants you to move without ever checking it?"
"Si." He glances toward the closed door, as if expecting someone to break through it.
"Tell me his name."
"I don't know his name. Please, you got what you came for. Leave now, before someone sees?—"
I shake my head. "We both know I can't do that."
His mouth opens and I take the shot. One bullet through the mouth—a single stark line that removes the conversation and whatever protection he thought he had. The sound barely echoes before Matteo drops, a man reduced to silence by his own secrets. The saint in the painting above him watches me.
I stare at it while cleaning my gun before sliding it back under my jacket. "At least I didn't break off his fingers, so quit looking at me like that."
I'm talking to paintings now, apparently. Well past the sanity check.
Grabbing the ledger from the desk, I stare at the symbol bleeding faintly through to the next page. On the back, the word PROCESSED is crossed out in red. There's something else in Italian, and I don't need a translator to make it out:
Transferred to pri—the pen line ends in a sharp streak, like someone pulled the page away mid-signature.
She was here, but he changed his mind. Was he trying to teach her a lesson?
I roll my neck, hating the tension in my shoulders.
Nick's voice cuts through the static in my ear. "You breathing?"
"Yeah."
"Did you have to kill him?"
"I'm going to ignore that tone every time you try to sound like a therapist. He was wasting my time. Told me to forget about her." I pause at the door, glancing back at the mess I made. "Who the fuck does he think he is telling me to move on?"
Nick groans, not even bothering at this point. "You get coordinates at least?"
"No. Just confirmation." I step into the night, gravel crunching under my shoes. "I'm going to need you to pull everything you can on the Ferryman."
"Have you thought about this?"
"I'll stop at nothing to find her, Nick. And god help anyone who gets in my way."
"I know." He pauses. "We're on it."
The line goes dead, and I stop walking before getting in the car, inspecting the ink again in the moonlight. The logo looks like something the grim reaper would have.
She's alive.
And this fucker has put his hands on her.
