Page 70 of Brutal
16
DELANEY
I don’t sleep.
I lie in my bed for hours, staring at the ceiling, replaying everything.
The apartment.
The drawers.
The blanket.
The way the air felt wrong before I even knew why.
And then?—
Him.
Samson Vexley.
His voice. His body. The heat of him closing in, taking up space.
My heart races just thinking about it.
I roll onto my side and press my face into the pillow.
He was here for minutes. Maybe less. But he left something behind.
I push myself up, swing my legs over the side of the bed, and check the time.
4:12 a.m.
Too early to call anyone. Too early to pretend this is a normal day.
But perfect for working.
I grab my laptop from the nightstand and fire it up. But working in bed feels all wrong. I rise, walk to the kitchen, bypassing my desk where I usually work, and set the computer on the kitchen table.
I open my notes on the contractor. High-end security installations. Private clients. Money moving through channels that look clean. Licensing boards. Public filings. Corporate registrations.
At first, it looks like nothing.
Then it starts to look like something.
Names repeat.
Not the same names—it’s never that obvious—but similar structures. Same registered agent. Same formation patterns. Same quiet dissolutions followed by new entities that pick up exactly where the last one left off.
A network that’s not big enough to attract attention, but not small enough to be accidental. I pull up a spreadsheet and map it out, linking entities, dates, directors.
And then I see it.
A project tied to one of the entities, buried in a line item most people would skip.
Marina redevelopment.
My breath stills.
