Page 3 of Shadowed Vows: Ghost
This is the same gut feeling that got Jenny killed.
I snap a quick photo with my camera, making sure the flash is off. Hopefully I'll be able to enhance it later.
The keycard reader is military-grade, not the cheap security you'd find at a storage facility. Someone's invested serious money to keep whatever's behind this door hidden.
The footsteps grow louder. Boot soles against concrete, purposeful and measured. My fingers brush against the pepper spray in my pocket. Small comfort against whoever employs professional security in an abandoned warehouse.
The sound of approaching voices sends me scurrying deeper into the warehouse, away from my entry point.
If they find me here...
"Motherfucker," I breathe as my shoulder clips something hard. Pain blooms across my collarbone.
The farther I move, the stranger the warehouse becomes. One hallway looks completely abandoned—dust-covered floors, peeling paint. Turn a corner and suddenly I'm in a pristine corridor with fresh paint and clean floors.
It's like two different buildings merged together.
My fingers trace along a wall, feeling the transition between neglect and maintenance. Someone's creating a facade, and they're doing it methodically.
A door stands ajar at the end of the corridor. Beyond it, white fluorescent light spills onto the floor. Every instinct tells me to turn back, but my feet carry me forward. Just one peek.
I ease up to the doorway, peering through the crack. My breath catches.
Inside is a fully operational monitoring station. Three large screens display what can only be security camera feeds of the building's exterior and various interior sections. A uniformed guard sits with his back to me, tapping at a keyboard.
This is a professional operation. Sophisticated.
My hands tremble as I back away. Whatever's happening here goes beyond an escort service. This is organized, funded, and dangerous.
My foot scuffs against an uneven spot in the floor and I freeze.
Move, Alina. Now.
Adrenaline surges through my system as I turn and hurry down the corridor, my senses heightened to painful clarity. Every shadow seems to shift, every sound amplified. My heartbeat thunders in my ears as I navigate back toward my entry point, careful to step where the dust has already been disturbed.
"East corridor clear," a voice calls from somewhere behind me.
They're sweeping the building.
I duck behind a column as a beam of light sweeps past. Sweat trickles down my temple. My breathing sounds impossibly loud in my head.
When the light passes, I continue moving, trying to recall the twists and turns that led me here. Left at the broken machinery. Right at the collapsed shelving. Straight past the old office.
The window I entered through should be just ahead. I can make out the faint glow of streetlights filtering through.
Almost there...
A shadow moves across my peripheral vision, and I freeze.
Time's up.
The shadow solidifies into a massive form moving with impossible silence for someone so large. I press my back against the wall, holding my breath. Maybe if I don't move—
He emerges from the darkness like a phantom, faster than any human should be able to move. One second the space before me is empty, the next I'm airborne.
The impact knocks the wind from my lungs as my back slams against the concrete floor. My camera clatters away, skidding across dust-covered cement. Pain radiates from my shoulder blades through my hip.
This is how I die.
