👉 Previous Decision: You chose to meet Evelyn at a neutral diner in Arlington.
I took the metro across the Potomac, my mind racing, the eviction notice and frozen bank accounts stark realities. Evelyn had arranged for us to meet at an unglamorous, 24-hour diner in North Arlington, a greasy spoon well outside the primary surveillance grid of D.C.
She was already seated in a vinyl booth, nursing a cold coffee. Her face was pale, lines of stress etched around her eyes. I slid in opposite her.
“He’s moved against you quickly,” Evelyn said, her voice flat. “Arthur doesn’t like loose ends.”
She pushed a small, encrypted analog device across the table. “These are internal emails. Proof that he’s been routing black-budget political donations through the rent payments of his residential tenants.”
I picked up the device, my fingers tracing the cold metal. “He uses his brownstones as laundering fronts,” Evelyn explained, her eyes scanning the nearly empty diner. “Every tenant in your building is an unwitting straw donor for a dozen different dark money PACs.”
Before I could fully process the implication, two dark sedans, their lights killed, pulled silently into the diner parking lot. They blocked both the main entrance and the rear service exit.
Evelyn’s head snapped up, her eyes narrowing. “He found us.”
➡️ Read CHAPTER 12 to continue the story.
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