I pressed my face against the frozen iron of the ventilation grate.

The draft coming through the shaft tasted of rusted metal and old snow.

Below me, in the corridor of the abandoned Blackwood Towers, my brother Dante stood in his long wool coat.

He looked older than I remembered.

The snow drifted through a shattered window, settling on his wide shoulders.

His lieutenant, Luca, stood a pace behind him, hands buried in his pockets.

Then the boy stepped out of the shadows.

He could not have been more than seven.

He wore a faded blue coat that was three sizes too small, and his boots were duct-taped at the toes.

“Are you the man who fixes things?” the boy asked.

His voice was tiny, shivering in the Chicago cold.

Dante knelt down, his knee sinking into the dirty slush on the concrete floor.

“Who sent you, kid?” Dante asked.

“Nobody,” the boy said. “I’m Eli. My mom is sick in Apartment 309. There is a monster in there.”

Eli reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of crumpled dollar bills and a plastic toy soldier.

“This is all I have,” Eli said. “Please.”

Dante looked at the money, then at the toy soldier with the chipped green paint.

He did not take them.

“Luca,” Dante said. “Take the boy’s hand.”

Dante stood up and drew his Beretta from beneath his coat.

I held my breath, pulling back into the dark crawlspace so the metal of my zipper wouldn’t scrape the duct.

They walked toward Apartment 309.

I crept through the ceiling vents, following the sound of their boots on the rotting floorboards.

Dante kicked the door of 309 off its hinges.

The apartment was freezing, smelling of damp plaster and cheap bleach.

On a mattress in the corner lay Rachel Mercer, Eli’s mother.

Her skin was gray, her lips tinged with a faint, unnatural blue.

She was breathing, but her eyes were glazed and unfocused.

Dante did not look at her first; his eyes scanned the peeling wallpaper near the closet.

He walked over and ripped a section of the paper away.