The warehouse in Red Hook looked different in daylight.
Not softer — nothing about this place would ever feel soft — but less theatrical. The industrial lights that had thrown dramatic shadows during our first meeting were off, replaced by gray autumn light filtering through grimy windows. Moran stood in the same spot as before, but the staging had changed. This wasn't a confrontation. It was a business meeting.
"Twenty-six hours," he said without preamble. "Both crews stood down. No violence, no dead bodies, no police investigations. You did what you said you'd do."
"I told you I could."
"You told me a lot of things. This is the first one I could verify." Moran pulled out a tablet and scrolled through something I couldn't see. "The documentation is thorough. Signed agreements, witness statements, proof of compliance. You understand how to close a deal."
"I understand that incomplete solutions create future problems." I kept my voice level, professional. We were past the immediate danger, but we weren't past danger entirely. "What happens now?"
"Now I make a report." Moran set the tablet aside. "I'll tell my employer that this 'Moriarty' is an independent operator. Competent. Potentially useful. Not an immediate threat to her interests."
The phrasing was deliberate. Not an immediate threat. The qualifier meant I was still being evaluated, still being watched, still existing on borrowed tolerance.
"And Dmitri?"
Moran gestured toward a door at the back of the warehouse. "Released. As promised."
The door opened, and Dmitri Volkov walked out.
He looked terrible — three days of professional interrogation had left dark circles under his eyes and a slight tremor in his hands. But he was alive, uninjured, walking under his own power. Moran's people had been thorough but not cruel. They'd wanted information, not suffering.
Dmitri's eyes found mine across the warehouse floor. I saw recognition there, and something else. Understanding. Whoever he'd thought I was before — the mysterious fixer with unusual knowledge — he was seeing something different now. Someone who'd negotiated with killers and walked away with a win.
"Mr. Dalton," he said. His voice was rough, probably from talking more than he'd intended. "I told them what I knew."
"I know. It's fine."
"It doesn't feel fine."
"It will." I walked toward him, stopping at a distance that respected his obvious need for space. "You survived. That's what matters."
Moran watched the exchange with professional detachment. He wasn't sentimental about any of this — the threat, the resolution, the human cost. It was all mathematics to him. Leverage and outcomes and acceptable losses.
"A warning," Moran said, drawing both our attention. "My employer knows about you now. She's read my report. She's... interested."
The word landed with weight it shouldn't have carried. Interested. Jamie Moriarty was interested in someone using her name.
"Should I be concerned?" I asked.
"You should be careful." Moran moved toward the warehouse exit, his bulk somehow graceful despite its size. "Don't make her curious enough to visit personally. That never ends well for the interesting ones."
He left without another word. The warehouse door closed behind him, and I was alone with Dmitri and the particular silence of spaces that had witnessed violence.
"Who was that?" Dmitri asked quietly.
"Someone who works for the person whose name I borrowed."
"And you negotiated with him? Convinced him to let me go?"
"I convinced him I was more useful alive than dead. You were leverage. Now you're not." I pulled out my phone and ordered a car. "Come on. Let's get you home."
---
The cab ride to Dmitri's apartment was quiet. He stared out the window at the city passing by, processing whatever had happened during those three days. I didn't ask for details. He'd share if he wanted to, and if he didn't, the silence was fine.
"They asked about your documents," he said finally. "Where you came from. Why your background was so clean."
"What did you tell them?"
"The truth. That you appeared out of nowhere with money and knowledge, that your story didn't quite add up, that I didn't ask questions because you paid well." He turned to look at me. "They already knew most of it. They just wanted confirmation."
"And now they have it."
"And now they have it." Dmitri's expression was complicated — gratitude and wariness and something that might have been respect. "You could have let them keep me. Used the time to run."
"Running wouldn't have helped. And you didn't deserve to suffer for my choices."
The cab stopped outside Dmitri's building. He sat for a moment, not moving, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a creased business card. His own card, the one he gave to clients.
"I still don't know who you really are," he said. "But whatever you're building — whatever game you're playing — I want in. Whoever's watching you, whoever's hunting you, at least you came back for me."
I took the card. It felt heavier than it should have.
"Get some rest," I said. "I'll be in touch."
Dmitri nodded and climbed out of the cab. I watched him walk into his building, shoulders hunched against phantom threats, and tried not to think about the cost of the choices I'd made.
Somewhere in London or wherever Jamie Moriarty actually spent her time, a woman I'd never met was reading reports about a man who'd borrowed her name. She was interested. She was watching.
The game had officially escalated beyond what I could control.
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