CRYPTO: Infidelity (Book 1)

CHAPTER 32: SCHEME

Rockie set his phone up so I could see the directions and I drove for a while, wondering where we were going. Rockie wouldn't say.

A text message popped up on his phone from someone called Hux. It read, "Where are you? The train already passed."

Rockie grabbed his phone.

"Who's Hux?" I asked.

"Just someone I'm getting instructions from," he said. "Don't worry about it."

I wasn't worried until he told me not to worry. I wondered if I should be concerned. Were they gonna get on a train? Maybe they were in serious trouble and needed to leave the state, but if that were the case, I would have heard about it since I was a cop. Maybe they were leaving before word got out that they did something wrong. Maybe they wouldn't tell me where we were going because I was a cop.

"You have arrived," Rockie's phone finally said after about twenty more minutes of driving.

"Arrived where?" I asked. There was no train station or anything. Just more road. "There's nothing here."

"Look up ahead," Rockie said.

I drove a couple of feet forward and saw a car parked on some railroad tracks.

"Why'd they stop?" I asked.

"Maybe they got stuck," Jordan said.

"Or fell asleep?" Cam guessed.

"Not a great place to fall asleep," I said. I honked the car horn, but the car didn't budge. "Is there even anyone inside?"

"Yeah. I see someone," Rockie said. "It looks like they're awake."

"Just go around them," Cam said.

"I think we should talk to them to see what's up," I said.

"Good idea," Rockie said. "You should do that."

"Alright." I pulled the car off to the side of the road and put it in park. "I'll be right back."

As I walked to the car, I felt like I was on duty again, only I wasn't wearing a bulletproof vest and I didn't have any weapons on me. I realized I should be more cautious. This animal could be insane and dangerous.

I knocked on the driver's window.

The ferret inside rolled it down. "What do you want?"

"I just noticed you were parked on the railroad track."

"Nice detective work, Sherlock," he said.

"Why are you parked on a railroad track? Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

"Actually, yes."

"Why?"

"What does it matter to you?"

"I just want to help. What's your name? I'm Crypto."

"Huxley," he said.

"Huxley? Do you happen to know a mountain lion named Rockie?"

"Uh... Why do you ask?"

"You were texting him, weren't you?"

"Must have been a different Hux."

"How did you know he has Hux as a contact and not Huxley if you don't know him?"

"Uh... Lucky guess? That doesn't matter right now anyway. Look! The train is coming!"

I looked to see the light of the freight train at a distance. "You're in the mafia, correct?"

He shrugged. "Aren't you going to try to save me?"

"Nah," I said. "You don't want to be saved. I wouldn't want to overstep." I started to walk away as the train came closer, blaring its horn.

"Wait!" Huxley got out of his car. "I decided I don't want to die." He stepped over the tracks, but then tripped. "Help! I'm stuck!"

The train was now only a few feet away. I turned my back to him and kept walking. It didn't matter to me if he died. He was a bad guy.

I heard the train crash into the car and woosh by. I looked back to see that the train hadn't slowed down. It pushed the car off the tracks and the train cars kept coming. Huxley stood safely out of the way.

"You were supposed to save him with your power by exploding the train!" Rockie told me as he got out of the car.

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

"You was gonna let me die!" Huxley exclaimed.

"Why were you texting Rockie?" I asked him. "Was this a setup?"

"Wasn't my idea," he said.

I looked at Rockie.

"Wasn't my idea either," Rockie said. "It was the boss's. He wanted to see if you had been practicing."

"He could've just asked me," I said.

Jordan and Cam got out of the car. "What's going on?" they asked.

"He didn't trust you to be honest. He wanted to see for himself," Rockie told me. "I was gonna record you exploding that train."

"You put your life on the line for this stupid plan?" I asked Huxley.

"I have Super Speed," he said. "I was never in any danger."

"You haven't been practicing, have you," Rockie said to me.

"The boss doesn't believe I follow through with my word?" I asked. "Record this."

Rockie held up his phone as I turned to face the train which was still going by. I thought about what I wanted to do Spiney for all the awful things he was responsible for. I focused all that energy onto the train and one of the train cars exploded.

Huxley turned around to see. "Holy-"

The next train car exploded as I focused on my jealousy. Then the next car exploded, and the next like it set off a chain reaction until the last train car was gone.

I turned around to face the phone camera.

"THAT WAS ******* AWESOME!" Rockie shouted.

Huxley, Cam, and Jordan cheered. Duke had missed the whole thing since he was still asleep in the car, even with all the noise.