Chapter 14: THE VISITOR

Chapter 14: THE VISITOR
I didn’t move for a good five seconds. Long enough for my brain to start listing all the wrong scenarios... armed guys in black gear, some creep with a smile, or worst of all… a neighbor asking to borrow sugar.

Eventually, muscle memory kicked in. Quiet steps. Shoulder grazing the wall. Eye to the peephole.
Nothing.
Not the empty kind of nothing either... the stretched kind. The hallway light buzzed faintly. The shadows felt wrong. Like someone had just been there but decided to evaporate.

Then I saw it.
On the floor, dead center in front of my door. A small white envelope. No stamp. No smudge of handling. Just… placed there like an offering. Or a dare.
My name was on the front in sharp, clean block letters. Not handwritten. Typed. Perfect spacing. Perfect alignment. The kind of precision that says: I had time to do this right.

Every instinct screamed not to touch it. Which is exactly why I bent down and picked it up.
The paper was heavy. Expensive. A faint scent of something chemical... not perfume, not cologne, just… processed. I tore the flap and slid the contents into my hand.

One playing card.
The Queen of Spades. Crisp, new, edges sharp enough to cut skin if you were careless. I flipped it over.
On the back, in the same typed font:
Time’s a luxury.

No signature. No explanation. Just a message that sounded like it belonged in the same family as last night’s call. The family that sent threats as if they were calendar invites.

I stood there staring at it for maybe a minute too long, until my brain snapped back into gear and my fingers were already dialing Dante’s number. He picked up on the second ring.

“What’s wrong?” His voice was clean, clipped—like a scalpel.
“You tell me,” I said. “Someone just knocked on my door and left me… a playing card.”
“What kind of card?”
“Queen of Spades. Typed message on the back. Says ‘Time’s a luxury.’”
A pause. Too long to be casual.
“Where is it now?”
“In my hand. Where else would it... ”
“Don’t move. I’m eight minutes out.”
Click.

Eight minutes. Which is how long it takes for paranoia to start whispering in your ear. I locked the door. Checked the window. Checked Aaron’s room—empty. He’d apparently gone out, probably to chase pizza or bad decisions. I turned the card over in my hand again. Time’s a luxury. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Luxury for who?

The knock hadn’t come again. The hallway was still silent. By the fifth minute, I was pacing. By the seventh, I was considering opening the door just to prove to myself there wasn’t anyone still out there.
At exactly eight minutes, there was another knock... this one sharper, faster.
“It’s me,” Dante’s voice came through, low.

I opened the door and he stepped in like he’d been poured from the shadows in the hall. Black coat, black gloves, that same stillness that somehow made you think he could hear a mouse sneeze three floors down. He scanned my apartment like it was a crime scene, eyes catching on every corner, every surface.

“Where was it?” he asked.
“On the floor. Center of the door.”
“You touch the outside?”
“I picked it up, yeah. Sorry, next time I’ll leave the creepy calling card on my doormat for the rats.”
No reaction. Not even a ghost of a smirk. He pulled a small flashlight from his coat pocket and angled it over the envelope, checking edges and seams. Then he slid the card into a clear evidence sleeve like he’d done this a thousand times.

“What does it mean?” I asked.
He didn’t answer immediately, which was never a good sign.
“Steve will want to see it,” he finally said.
“That’s it? You’re not even going to tell me if I should be sleeping with one eye open?”
“I think you already do.”

He was at the door before I could come up with a snappy comeback, and then he was holding it open for me.
“Let’s go.”
“Go where?”
“Steve’s.”
“Do I get to change into something less… hoodie and pajama pants?”
“No.”
“Fantastic.”

The hallway felt colder than it should’ve. Dante took point, walking just ahead of me, head tilting slightly every time we passed a door. His pace wasn’t rushed, but it was direct—like he’d mapped every step before we even started. We hit the elevator, and he swiped a card that took us straight to the basement garage.

The car waiting for us wasn’t the Rolls this time. It was a black SUV, windows tinted so dark they could’ve doubled as confession booths. Dante held the door open for me without looking directly at me, and I slid into leather that smelled like money and distance.

We drove in silence. The streets were nearly empty at this hour, the city’s usual chaos folded into something quieter, heavier. I watched buildings slide past in the window, neon blurring into shadow.
Dante didn’t take the main route to Midtown. We cut through streets I’d never been down before—tight one-ways lined with old brick and high fences. Every few blocks, he glanced in the rearview, eyes lingering just long enough to make me wonder if we were being followed.

When we finally pulled into the underground garage of Steve’s building, Dante parked in a space so far from the entrance it felt deliberate. He got out first, scanned the area, then opened my door. I was half-tempted to salute him just to break the tension.

We took the private elevator up. The ride was smooth and fast, but it still felt like the walls were pressing in a little. Dante didn’t speak. Didn’t look at me. Just stood there with his hands in his pockets, the evidence sleeve tucked under one arm like it was more important than either of us.

When the doors opened, we stepped into the kind of penthouse that made your lungs forget how to work for a second. Steve was there, standing behind his desk with the skyline spilling out behind him like a painting. He didn’t look at me first. His eyes were on something in front of him on the desk.

It was another playing card.
The Queen of Spades.
Identical to mine.
Only difference was the back. I couldn’t see all of it from here, but I caught just enough of the typed letters to know it wasn’t the same message.

Steve finally looked up. And whatever was in his eyes made the room feel smaller.
“Let’s see yours,” he said.