Page 51 of Stolen Empire

I'm having second thoughts about whether I can trust her, but I have no other choice.

I won't just drag someone in off the street.

The way things happened so perfectly, it's like fate gave her to me.

She's it, or I can’t do this.

"Yes."

She exhales slowly, her shoulders sagging.

"Fine. Tell me what I need to know."

I spend the next three hours drilling her.

She sits at the desk while I pace, rattling off details she needs to memorize.

Radich couriers use black duffel bags with no logos, always arriving in pairs.

Their bookkeeper is a man named Varlam who smokes unfiltered cigarettes and never carries a phone.

Their street enforcers wear red shoelaces as identification, and their runners are expected to use coded slang when placing bets.

She absorbs it all without complaint, though I can see the strain in her eyes.

She rubs her temples.

"This is insane."

I stop pacing, standing in front of her.

"You need to understand what you’re walking into. These men are not forgiving. They don’t give second chances. If you slip, if you panic, if you say the wrong thing at the wrong time, they'll bury you in a ditch outside the city and no one will ever find your body."

Her face pales, but she doesn’t look away.

"I won’t let that happen," I add, crouching in front of her with my hands on the armrests of the chair she's in.

"But you have to trust me. You have to follow the plan."

She swallows hard.

"So, what's the plan?"

I pull a folded paper from my pocket and spread it on the desk.

It's a rough map of the track and the surrounding blocks, marked with red and blue circles.

"Red is where the Radiches have been spotted in the past two weeks. Blue is where their couriers make pickups. They rotate every three days, but the pattern is consistent."

I tap the south gate marker.

"This is where you will start. Thursday afternoon. You'll be there to collect a payment from one of our regulars, a man who always pays late. The Radich crew watches that gate because it's the least guarded. If they see you there alone, carrying cash, they'll approach."

"And then what?"

"You play dumb. You act nervous. You tell them you work for me but you’re not loyal. You mention that you have debts. You let them think you’re vulnerable, but you sell them the story thoroughly."

She shakes her head and runs a hand through her hair.