Chapter 8
Chapter 8 — Eight Days and Other Countdowns
Elara spends eight days preparing for the next Cross event, mapping Mercer's involvement, and cultivating DuVall as an inside witness. She meets DuVall alone backstage at the venue, where DuVall reveals she has been complicit in Cross's operation and wants out before Mercer's participation escalates things beyond what she can stomach. Kael and Elara refine their plan to document the private session with Mercer present. The chapter ends with Elara positioned inside the venue on event night, watching Cross's security tighten around the private room, as DuVall sends a single text: HE'S HERE.
Eight days is a generous amount of time if you're planning a vacation. It's an eternity if you're planning a homicide.
I spent the first two days building Mercer's profile. State Senator Alan Mercer, age fifty-one, married, two children in private school, voting record that reads like a choose-your-own-adventure novel where every path leads to whoever paid him most recently. His committee on gaming and entertainment regulation oversaw exactly the industry that employed Damon Cross, which meant Mercer had both motive and mechanism. The forty-seven thousand dollars routed through his brother-in-law's consulting firm wasn't subtle. It was the financial equivalent of leaving a fingerprint on the murder weapon and then posting a selfie with it.
But Mercer attending one of Cross's private sessions—that was different. That was a man who'd stopped paying for cover and started paying for access.
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