Unit 47B

The rain hadn’t stopped for two days, turning the cracked asphalt behind Public Storage into a shallow lake. Floodlights flickered against the mist, catching on the sheen of metal roll-up doors that lined the long, echoing corridor.

Evelyn Cross pulled her jacket tighter and cursed the storm. She’d drawn the short straw—night shift security, again. The warehouse complex was supposed to be empty after hours, but the sensor in Unit 47B had been tripped twice in ten minutes. Rats, she told herself. Always rats.

Still, protocol was protocol. She grabbed her flashlight and keyring, her boots splashing through puddles as she made her way down the row.

The air inside the corridor was colder than outside. It smelled of oil, dust, and something metallic—something that didn’t belong. Evelyn stopped at 47B. The padlock was hanging loose.

“Not good,” she muttered, flicking on her radio. “Dispatch, this is Cross. I’ve got a break-in at forty-seven Bravo.”

Static. Then nothing.

Her flashlight beam cut across the corrugated walls, trembling slightly with her pulse. She took a deep breath and lifted the door. It rattled halfway before jamming. Just enough space to duck under.

Inside was darkness—and the faint hum of a generator somewhere deeper in the building. Evelyn swept her light over a stack of crates, a tarp, a few unmarked boxes. Nothing seemed out of place until the beam caught something pale near the back wall.

She moved closer. The shape resolved into a man slumped against a crate, head tilted to one side. A dark pool spread from beneath him, reflecting her light like black glass.

Her breath hitched.

The flashlight trembled.

It wasn’t rats.

It was a body.

By the time the first police cruiser rolled up, the rain had slowed to a thin drizzle. Red and blue lights smeared across the wet pavement, flashing against the endless rows of storage units like ghosts passing between doors.

Detective Marcus Hale stepped out of his unmarked sedan, coffee in one hand, notebook in the other. He’d been pulled from bed an hour ago—third homicide this month, and all three within a mile of the docks.

He nodded toward Evelyn, who stood near the warehouse office under a flickering light, wrapped in a gray blanket. Her eyes were red, her hands shaking around a styrofoam cup of coffee.

“Evening,” Hale said. “You the one who found him?”

She nodded, voice barely a whisper. “Unit 47B. Motion sensor went off twice. When I opened the door… he was already gone.”

“Did you touch anything?”

“No. I called it in right away, but the radio—”

“Didn’t work?” Hale finished for her. She nodded again. He frowned. “That’s convenient.”

Inside the unit, the forensic techs were already at work—flashbulbs popping, evidence markers forming a bright yellow constellation around the body.

The victim was a man in his fifties, dressed in a raincoat that had seen better days. No wallet, no phone. A faint smell of gasoline lingered in the air. Hale crouched beside him.

“Any ID?” he asked.

One of the techs shook his head. “Nothing. But get this—” He lifted a corner of the tarp that had been pushed aside. Beneath it was an old cargo manifest, dated three weeks ago, stamped with the name Blue Harbor Imports.

Hale’s brow furrowed. “That place burned down last month.”

“Yeah,” the tech said. “And rumor has it, the fire wasn’t an accident.”

Hale stood, scanning the narrow unit again. “So our dead guy might be connected.”

He turned to Evelyn, who was watching from the doorway, pale under the buzzing light. “You said the alarm tripped twice before you came out here. That means someone else was inside—before you found the body.”

She swallowed hard. “You think they’re still here?”

Hale’s gaze swept the long corridor outside, shadows stretching between each steel door. The night was silent except for the slow, steady drip of rain.

“Let’s hope not,” he said. “Because if they are…”

He paused, reaching into his coat for his flashlight.

“…they already know we’re looking for them.”