Chapter 35 : Elena's Source
Seven hours until the death window.
I called Elena at six in the morning, knowing she'd be awake. Information brokers didn't keep normal hours—they kept hours that matched their sources, which meant being available whenever someone had something to sell.
"Early call," she said. "Important?"
"Critical. I need security rotation data for a specific location. The old cannery building on Fortieth. Security company called Guardian Services. I need to know their shift change times for today."
Silence on the line. I could almost hear Elena processing the request, mapping it against her network of sources, calculating what it would take to get the information.
"That's... specific," she said finally. "Guardian Services isn't public-facing. They handle private security for high-value targets. Corporate clients, criminal organizations, people who don't want their protection patterns known."
"I know."
"Getting that information would require burning a source relationship I've maintained for three years. A contact inside their operations who's fed me valuable intel on dozens of other matters."
"I know that too."
Another silence, longer this time. When Elena spoke again, her voice was careful—not suspicious, but trying to understand.
"Why?"
"Because someone's going to die today if I don't have that information. And I can't explain more than that."
"You're asking me to destroy a three-year investment based on 'someone's going to die.'"
"Yes."
"That's not how this works, Sheldon. That's not how any of this works. I built my business on careful cultivation of sources, on never asking for more than they could safely give, on protecting the relationships that protect me."
"I know. I'm asking you to break those rules. For me."
I heard her breathing on the other end of the line—steady, controlled, the breath of someone working through a difficult calculation. The Elena I'd met three months ago would have hung up. That Elena lived entirely in a transactional world, where favors were measured and debts were tracked and nothing was given without something received.
But three months of building something different—of protecting her network without asking for payment, of caring about her beyond what she could provide, of treating her like a person instead of an asset—had changed the equation.
"Hold," she said.
The line went quiet. I waited, watching the clock, feeling each minute tick past like a countdown to something I couldn't stop.
Ten minutes later, she came back.
"Shift change happens at fourteen hundred hours. Full rotation—new team comes in, old team goes out, fifteen-minute overlap while they brief. The east entrance is covered by a single guard during the overlap while everyone else is inside doing handoff."
"Thank you."
"There's more. Guardian Services has been on elevated alert for the past week. Someone important is using that location today. I couldn't get details, but the security posture suggests high-value target."
High-value target. The finale events unfolding exactly as I remembered them—a confrontation at this location, protection details in place, and somewhere in the chaos that followed, a death that shouldn't happen.
"Elena—"
"Don't." Her voice was soft. "Don't thank me, don't apologize, don't explain why you needed this. Just—" She paused. "—do whatever you're doing and come back. We have unfinished conversations."
"I will."
"You'd better. I burned a three-year relationship for this. The explanation you promised me just got more expensive."
I understood. The debt between us had shifted—no longer measured in information or favors, but in something more personal. Elena had sacrificed a professional asset because I asked her to. That kind of trust carried weight.
"When this is over," I said, "you'll get everything. The full story. All of it."
"I'm counting on it."
She hung up.
I saved her contact information to my encrypted backup—the secure storage I'd set up through Barry for emergencies. Whatever happened today, Elena had earned more than I could ever repay. If I survived, I'd find a way. If I didn't... at least the information would help someone else understand what I'd been trying to do.
Six hours until the window. All the pieces were in place.
Now I just had to hope I'd positioned them correctly.
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