Chapter 119
Chapter 119
"You think this guy is connected to that text message?" Evelyn asked.
"Most likely. The message was sent fifteen minutes after the signing ended. He left the building seven minutes before it wrapped up." Cedric's thumb brushed once against the fabric on her shoulder. "He came to confirm you were there in person. Once he confirmed it, he sent the text."
Evelyn's fingers curled against the desk.
"To lure me to the north side."
"Yeah."
"Cedric, what's really buried under that land?"
Cedric didn't answer right away. His hand slid off her shoulder as he pulled up a chair and sat down beside her. Their knees nearly touched—his long legs took up too much space. Evelyn had to shift back.
"That land in the north, in the early 20th century, was part of the old foreign concession." Cedric leaned back in his chair, his fingers drumming lightly on the armrest. "During the war, they built air-raid shelters there. After the war ended, some were filled in, some converted to city drainage tunnels. But records show one section was never officially sealed."
Evelyn's heart skipped a beat. "Where's that section?"
"Southeast corner of the Phase Three lot."
Their eyes met.
The office lights were cold and white, casting faint shadows in the hollows beneath Cedric's eyes. The way he looked at her carried a weight she'd grown used to—not scrutiny, but focus. Like he could never bear to look away.
"When the north side project filed for historic preservation review, I went through old maps at the city archives." Cedric continued. "That unsealed shelter was marked once on a map. The person who signed off on it was—Upton."
Evelyn's nails dug into her palm.
Upton.
The old butler of the Ashford family. The man who'd been silenced in the nursing home. The man who'd scrawled 'BW H' with a trembling hand before he died.
"What did he hide down there?" Evelyn's voice dropped.
"Don't know. But someone does." Cedric's fingers stopped drumming. He turned his head, his gaze drifting past her through the floor-to-ceiling window toward the city skyline shrouded in dusk.
"Whoever sent that text. And whoever showed up in the conference room today."
Outside, another ginkgo leaf fell, pressing against the glass—thin, translucent, its veins as clear as a miniature map.
Evelyn pulled her gaze from the window and settled it on Cedric's profile. His jawline looked especially sharp in the sidelight, his Adam's apple shifting once.
"I'm going to the north side tomorrow," Evelyn said.
Cedric turned to look at her.
"Together." It wasn't a question.
Evelyn didn't refuse. She just reached out, her fingers brushing the back of his hand where it rested on the armrest. The touch was light, like wind across water. But Cedric's hand flipped over immediately, lacing his fingers through hers.
Palm to palm. His warmth transferred through the contact—dry and steady, like a sun-warmed stone in winter.
"Cedric, what if that text about 'something worth more than four billion'—what if it's physical evidence from when the Ashford family swallowed the Hawk family's assets? Evidence they moved underground?"
Cedric's thumb slid across the back of her hand.
"Could be. Could be something else."
"Something else like what?"
Cedric looked into her eyes. Three seconds of silence.
In those three seconds, the office air conditioning hummed low, someone dragged a suitcase down the hallway, and the elevator chimed in the distance.
"Eve, have you ever thought about this—" His voice dropped half a degree. "After your mom was kicked out of the Hawk family, she lived in this city for nearly twenty years. No job. No savings. No family support. But she raised you."
Evelyn's fingers curled in his palm.
"How does a woman stripped of everything survive in a city like this?"
It was a question Evelyn had never seriously considered.
She only remembered her mother always wearing dark clothes, speaking in a low voice, signing documents as 'Kendall,' never 'Hawk.' She remembered the rental apartment with pale green wallpaper, a small patch of mold in the corner. She remembered her mother leaving early and coming home late, but never saying where she worked.
"You mean—" Evelyn's throat felt dry. "My mom might have… left something down there?"
Cedric didn't confirm or deny.
He just tightened his grip on her hand.
Outside, dusk pressed down completely. City lights began flickering on one by one. The thirty-sixth-floor office was empty now except for her desk lamp, casting their shadows onto the cream-colored floor where they overlapped.
Like a single shape.
---
The next morning at nine, Evelyn and Cedric arrived at the Peace Alley construction site in the north side.
The autumn sunlight felt thin, leaking through gaps in the gray-white clouds and washing over the old buildings not yet demolished, tinting the weathered red brick walls a warm yellow.
The engineering team had arrived first. Three people in fluorescent safety vests stood by a section of barriers at the southeast corner of the Phase Three lot. The barriers were new—blue metal panels with 'Construction Area, No Entry' warnings posted on them.
Cedric had the engineering team remove the barriers. When the metal panels were pulled away, they revealed a patch of ground covered in gravel and weeds. In the center sat a round concrete cover, about four feet in diameter, its edges thick with moss.
Evelyn crouched down, her fingers brushing the cover's surface. The concrete was old—cracked in places, rust-colored water seeping through the fissures.
There was an iron pull-ring on the cover. The ring's surface had oxidized to black, but its shape was intact.
"This is the entrance to that shelter section?" Evelyn asked.
The engineering supervisor nodded. "We sent someone to survey yesterday afternoon. Below the cover is a vertical shaft, about thirteen feet deep. At the bottom, it connects to a horizontal tunnel. Length unknown."
Cedric stood behind Evelyn, his eyes scanning the surroundings. This southeast corner was wedged between two old buildings not yet demolished, invisible from the street outside.
Hidden.
"Has anyone moved this cover?" Cedric asked.
"Yes." The supervisor pointed to a mark on the cover's edge. "Pry marks here. Can't determine when, but the oxidation layer on the iron ring shows wear in one spot—looks like someone gripped it recently."
Evelyn's fingers paused on that worn spot. She could feel how the metal surface there was smoother than the surrounding area, missing that rough oxidized layer.
Recently.
The man who appeared at yesterday's signing knew where this entrance was.
"Open it," Cedric told the supervisor.