No Proof

The bar sat on a stretch of road with no name Rosalind recognized, tucked between a boarded-up laundromat and a gas station that looked like it had been closed for years. She stood across the street at 8:55, hood up, watching the door.

Dahlia found her before she found Dahlia.

"You're early," Dahlia said, appearing beside her like she'd stepped out of the shadows themselves.

"Couldn't sit still at home."

"Good. Means you're taking this seriously." Dahlia nodded toward the bar. "His name's Tomas. He ran numbers for the club for almost ten years before Silas found a reason to push him out. Let me do the talking at first. He doesn't trust strangers."

"I'm a stranger."

"You're Marcus's kid. That'll buy you thirty seconds. After that, you're on your own."

Inside, the bar was dim and mostly empty, a handful of men hunched over drinks who didn't look up when they walked in. Dahlia led her to a booth in the back where a heavyset man sat alone, a glass of something amber in front of him, untouched.

"Tomas," Dahlia said, sliding into the seat across from him. "This is Rosalind."

Tomas looked up slowly, eyes moving over her face, and something shifted in his expression when he placed the resemblance. "Marcus's girl."

"You knew my father."

"Knew him well enough to know he doesn't send his kid out to bars at night." Tomas glanced at Dahlia. "What is this?"

"She's asking the same questions I used to ask," Dahlia said. "About Silas."

Tomas's jaw tightened. He reached for his glass and took a slow drink before answering. "Then she should stop."

"I can't," Rosalind said. "Not when my father's life depends on it."

Something in her voice made Tomas look at her differently, longer this time, like he was reconsidering whatever he'd already decided about this conversation.

"You really believe that," he said. "Not just repeating something Dahlia told you to say."

"I believe it."

Tomas set the glass down and leaned forward slightly, voice dropping. "I kept the real books for this club for almost ten years. Every dollar that came in, every dollar that went out, all of it ran through me before Silas decided I'd become inconvenient."

"What happened?"

"He accused me of falsifying records. Said I'd been skimming for years. Brought it to the club with evidence I never created, numbers I never touched." Tomas's hands curled around the glass. "Nobody checked. Nobody wanted to check. Silas Cade doesn't get questioned. He gets believed."

Rosalind's chest tightened. "That's exactly what he did to Grayson."

Tomas's eyes flicked toward her sharply. "You talked to Grayson?"

"He wouldn't tell me anything."

"Because Grayson's smarter than I was," Tomas said. "He knows what happens to people who talk."

"What does happen?" Rosalind asked. "What actually happened to you, after the club pushed you out?"

Tomas was quiet for a long moment, staring down at his drink like the answer lived somewhere in the glass.

"I lost everything," he said finally. "My house. My marriage. My name means nothing in this town anymore, not after Silas made sure everyone believed I stole from my own club." His voice hardened. "But I'm alive. Which is more than I can say for the last person who tried to prove him wrong."

Rosalind's stomach dropped. "What do you mean?"

"There was a man. Before me. Foster, I think his name was. Started asking questions about money that didn't add up, same as I did years later." Tomas's voice dropped lower. "He disappeared. Everyone assumed he skipped town, owed money to the wrong people. Nobody looked too hard, because Silas made sure there was a story ready before anyone thought to ask."

The room felt colder suddenly. Rosalind glanced at Dahlia, who was watching Tomas with an expression that told her this wasn't news, just confirmation of something she'd already suspected.

"You think Silas killed him," Rosalind said quietly.

"I think," Tomas said, "that people who get too close to the truth about Silas Cade have a habit of disappearing or getting discredited before anyone believes a word they say. I got discredited. I count myself lucky."

Rosalind's hands were shaking slightly under the table. "There has to be proof somewhere. A real ledger. Something that shows what he's actually doing with the club's money."

"There is," Tomas said. "Or there was, back when I still had access. Silas keeps two sets of books. One for the club to see, clean, accounted for. And one real one, hidden somewhere only he can reach."

"Where?"

"I don't know exactly. But I know he doesn't trust banks, and he doesn't trust anyone else to hold onto something that valuable." Tomas considered a moment. "My guess would be somewhere close. Somewhere he controls completely. The clubhouse, maybe. Or his own home."

"That doesn't help us much," Dahlia said, frustration edging into her voice.

"It's more than you had an hour ago," Tomas snapped back.

Rosalind sat back, mind racing. A hidden ledger somewhere in Silas's own space, guarded by a man who'd already made two people disappear from the truth, one literally, one just from anyone believing him again.

"If I could get inside his house," Rosalind said slowly, "I could look."

"Absolutely not," Dahlia said immediately.

"Why not?"

"Because you're fifteen, and if he catches you searching his home, there's no story clever enough to explain that away. He'll know exactly what you're doing, and he'll stop pretending to be patient with you."

"Then what do you suggest?" Rosalind's voice sharpened, frustration bleeding through. "Because right now all we have is a notebook full of names nobody will confirm and a man who's too scared to say anything on the record."

Tomas held up a hand before Dahlia could respond. "There's someone else you could try. Someone still inside, close enough to Silas that she might know where he keeps things, but not close enough that he'd suspect her of digging."

"Who?"

"His assistant. Runs errands for him, keeps his schedule, that kind of thing. Young. New to the club, only been around a year or so. Name's Priya." Tomas glanced between the two of them. "I don't know if she'd help you. But if anyone's seen inside his private space without him noticing, it's her."

Rosalind filed the name away carefully. "Where do I find her?"

"That," Tomas said, "is where I stop helping. I've already said more than I should have." He finished his drink in one long swallow and slid out of the booth, standing slowly. "Marcus's girl or not, I'm not getting dragged back into this. I already paid the price once."

He walked out without looking back, leaving Rosalind and Dahlia alone in the booth.

"Priya," Dahlia said thoughtfully. "I've heard the name. Never met her."

"We need to find her."

"We will. Carefully." Dahlia's expression turned serious. "Rosalind, listen to me. Everything Tomas just told you, the man who disappeared, what happened to him and Grayson, that's exactly what happens to people who get too close. You need to understand what you're actually risking here."

"I understand."

"Do you?" Dahlia leaned forward. "Because you're fifteen years old asking questions that got a grown man erased from his own life."

Rosalind thought of the warehouse. Of the bullet. Of Kade's face, too late, always too late.

"I understand better than you think," she said quietly.

Dahlia studied her for a long moment, something unreadable behind her eyes, like she sensed there was more to that answer than Rosalind was willing to share.

"We should go," Dahlia said finally. "Before anyone notices how long we've been sitting here."

They walked out together into the cold night, and Rosalind's phone buzzed in her pocket just as they stepped onto the street.

Unknown number again.

She stopped walking, staring at the screen.

*Ask Dahlia what really happened to her brother.*

Rosalind's blood went cold.

She looked up at Dahlia, who was already three steps ahead, unaware, and for the first time since meeting her, Rosalind wasn't sure at all who she could actually trust.