A Midnight Package Delivered To My Desk Contains A Severed Hand And A 60-Minute Timer Pointing To My Son's Family
👉 Previous Decision: You chose to drive to the coordinates alone in an unmarked patrol car.
I pushed the unmarked cruiser hard down Route 1/9, the speedometer needle dancing at 90. My hands gripped the wheel, knuckles white. The digital timer on the cooler, now strapped into the passenger seat, blinked 31 minutes.
Silent sirens kept the night quiet. I needed no patrol lights painting a target on my back. My past, buried under thirty years of clean police work, felt like a fresh wound.
The warehouse compound loomed, a dark, sprawling shadow against the moonless sky. I swung the car into a service alley, cutting the engine. The silence pressed in.
The air inside the compound tasted of stale metal and something else, something cloying and sweet. I stepped over a faint line on the concrete. A soft click echoed.
Behind me, the heavy industrial doors shuddered, then hissed shut. Thick steel bars slammed into place. A faint red laser beam, just visible in the gloom, bisected the entryway.
My pulse hammered against my ribs. I had walked into it.
Across the cavernous space, a single bare bulb illuminated a scene. Eddie Bruno, my son’s father-in-law, sat slumped on an overturned crate. His eyes stared blankly.
A pre-programmed cell phone rested beside his still hand. Its screen glowed, counting down the last seconds. I reached for my service weapon, but my arm felt heavy.
This wasn’t a rescue. It was a setup. A cold, calculated frame designed to put me here, with him.
➡️ Read Chapter 7 to continue the story
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