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She squeezes my fingers. “You can come down and complain.”

I pull her back for a kiss. She lets me, until the fitter clears his throat behind us.

Rosa comes out of the walk-in with her coffee.

“The landlord’s lawyer sent the transfer,” she says.

“When do we sign?” Vera asks.

“When it’s quiet.” Rosa drinks her coffee. “Like we agreed.”

The next day, early in the morning, Grisha sends me a photograph.

It’s grainy, taken from the far side of the freight road behind Zorin’s yard, but I instantly recognize Daniel Reed getting out of his sedan, parked by the office trailer. I also recognize the tall foreman with one hand on the back of Daniel’s neck, the way you’d steer a dog.

Came in at 2:50, Grisha writes. Still inside.

Anton calls from the road. “Reed hasn’t been back to his apartment. Mail on the floor. His landlord says he owes two months. No one has seen him since we started looking.”

“You think they’re holding him?”

“Maybe. Or he’s been in hiding.” Anton is quiet for a moment. “Either way, he can’t say no to them anymore.”

That afternoon, Maxim sends for me.

Anton is on the speaker on his desk again. Pruitt’s wire records lie in a folder at Maxim’s elbow, with Brandt’s ledger copied beside them, and a third sheet in Anton’s handwriting that groups the shipment dates under the monthly payments.

“The northern freight will leave Zorin’s roads on Monday,” Maxim says, squaring the folder against the edge of the desk. “Meaning Zorin is finished with us. Tuesday night, you bring him to me.”

“Alive?”

“Alive. I have questions for him.” He looks at me. “Anton will give you four men. You take him from the yard after the night shift goes home. Nobody else.”

“And the foreman?”

“If he’s there, he comes too.”

“Reed?”

Maxim considers it.

“You’re going for Zorin,” he says. “Reed isn’t your assignment. If he’s there, keep him out of the way.”

That night, in my own kitchen, with the rosemary on the sill and Vera at the table with her notebook, I tell her because I said I would.

“Tuesday night, I’m going to bring Zorin in,” I say.

She puts the pencil down.

I see the fear in her eyes; she doesn’t want to understand what bringing him in means for Zorin or Daniel, but she needs to know for my sake.

“Alive. Maxim wants him alive.”

“And Daniel?”

“Grisha saw him at Zorin’s yard last night.” I tell her about the hand on the back of his neck. I hold nothing back. “If he’s there, I’ll keep him clear.”

She peers down at the notebook. “Okay,” she says. Then: “I don’t like this.”