Now I'll tell you something important about fear.
Most people think fear makes you run.
That's not always true.
Sometimes fear does something worse — it freezes you right where you stand, like your bones suddenly forgot how to work. That's exactly what happened to me when Victor Hale's eyes locked onto mine in that rail yard.
I stood there under the moonlight, feeling about as useful as a rabbit staring at a pack of wolves.
One of the big men beside Victor stepped forward and grabbed the collar of my jacket before I could think about moving.
"Kid's shaking like a leaf," he muttered.
Well of course I was shaking. I had just seen them kill a man.
They dragged me closer to the space between the train cars. Gravel crunched under my shoes, loud enough to make my ears ring.
Up close, Victor Hale looked even calmer than before. That was the strangest part.
You'd expect a man who just ordered a killing to look angry or wild or something like that.
But he didn't.
He looked like a man discussing the weather.
Victor studied me for a moment.
"How old are you?" he asked.
"Sixteen," I croaked.
One of the big men snorted.
"Too young to be sneaking around rail yards."
Victor raised a hand slightly and the man fell quiet.
"Name?" Victor asked.
"Ethan."
"Ethan what?"
"Cole."
He nodded once, like that piece of information had been filed away somewhere in his mind.
Then he looked over at the man slumped in the chair.
Or what used to be a man, anyway.
The moonlight hit the still figure and for a second I thought I might throw up right there in the gravel.
Victor noticed me staring.
"First time seeing something like that?" he asked calmly.
I didn't answer.
Truth was, my throat felt too tight to speak.
Victor turned back to his men.
"Leave us."
Both of the large men looked surprised.
"Boss—"
"I said leave us."
They hesitated, but only for a second.
Soon their footsteps faded into the darkness of the rail yard, leaving just the two of us standing there with the cold night wind and the quiet body in the chair.
Victor brushed a bit of dust off his coat.
Then he looked at me again.
"You were looking for copper wire," he said.
My head jerked up.
"How did you—"
"Kids your age don't wander into freight yards for exercise."
That was fair enough.
He walked slowly around the chair, studying the man tied to it like he was examining an old piece of furniture.
"You're probably wondering if I'm going to kill you," he said casually.
My stomach twisted.
Because that was exactly what I had been wondering.
Victor stopped walking and leaned against one of the train cars.
"Tell me something, Ethan Cole," he said.
"Did you enjoy watching?"
My eyes widened.
"What? No!"
"Good," he said.
"Because the ones who enjoy it usually grow up wrong."
For a moment neither of us spoke.
Wind rattled a loose metal sheet somewhere in the yard.
Then Victor asked a question that caught me completely off guard.
"Do you believe in luck?"
I blinked.
"I… don't know."
"Well," he said thoughtfully, "tonight you're very lucky."
My heart started beating faster again.
Lucky didn't seem like the right word for the situation.
Victor pushed himself away from the train car and stepped closer to me.
"Normally," he said calmly, "witnesses create a problem."
I swallowed hard.
"But tonight," he continued, "I see something different."
He studied my face again, like he was trying to read a book written across my forehead.
"Tell me," he said, "why didn't you run when you first saw us?"
"I… I didn't know what to do."
"That's not true."
He tilted his head slightly.
"You stayed because you wanted to know what would happen."
The way he said it made my skin crawl.
Because he was right.
Victor smiled faintly.
"Curiosity," he said.
"Very dangerous trait. But also a useful one."
He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small silver lighter, flipping it open and shut while he thought.
"Your father worked the docks," he said suddenly.
My head snapped up again.
"How do you know that?"
Victor didn't answer right away.
Instead he lit a cigarette and took a slow drag.
"Your father was an honest man," he said after a moment.
That made my chest tighten.
"You knew him?"
"In a way."
He flicked ash onto the gravel.
"He died about two years ago, didn't he?"
I nodded slowly.
"Accident," I said.
Victor watched the smoke drift into the night air.
"Yes," he said quietly.
"That's what the report said."
Something about the way he said that made my stomach sink.
Before I could ask anything else, he tossed the cigarette to the ground and crushed it under his shoe.
Then he looked straight at me again.
"Ethan," he said calmly.
"I'm going to give you two choices."
My heart started pounding again.
"First choice," he said.
"You walk away from this rail yard tonight and pretend you never saw anything."
That sounded good to me.
Too good.
"And the second?" I asked carefully.
Victor's smile returned — thin and sharp.
"The second," he said, "is that you come work for me."
My brain struggled to catch up.
"Work… for you?"
"Yes."
"Doing what?"
"Learning."
He gestured toward the dark rail yard.
"This world is bigger than the one you think you know."
I stared at him.
"You're serious?"
"Completely."
"But… why me?"
Victor's eyes glinted in the moonlight.
"Because," he said softly,
"boys who see something like tonight usually become one of two things."
He raised two fingers.
"Dead."
Then he lowered one finger.
"Or useful."
The cold wind blew through the rail yard again.
I looked at the man in the chair.
Then back at Victor Hale.
Somewhere deep in my chest, a terrible feeling started growing.
Because something about the way he spoke made it sound like my choice had already been decided.
Victor slipped his hands into his coat pockets and waited patiently.
"So," he said.
"What will it be, Ethan Cole?"
And right then, standing in that silent rail yard with the moon hanging above us…
I realized something.
Whatever answer I gave him tonight…
my life was never going back to normal again.