Page 197 of His Reckoning

The line goes dead. I stare at the phone for a second, then drop it onto the counter. Part of me knows he’s not wrong.

* * *

The knock comes sooner than I expected.

I don’t move at first until it comes again. I push off the counter and walk to the door, pulling it open.

Dean takes one look at me, and his expression shifts.

“Yeah,” he says. “You look like shit.”

“Good to see you too.”

He walks past me into the apartment without waiting to be invited. His eyes scan the room quick. They land on the book sitting on the couch.

“That it?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

He doesn’t pick it up, nor does he touch it. He just looks back at me.

“All right,” he says, “start talking.”

I lean back against the wall and cross my arms. “I already told you what happened.”

“No,” he says calmly. “You told me the surface version.”

I don’t respond.

Dean watches me for a second. “What aren’t you telling me?”

The question lands exactly where he meant it to.

I look away and run a hand through my hair. “This isn’t your problem.”

“Too late,” he says. “You made it my problem when you called.”

Silence stretches between us.

He doesn’t push again. He just waits, which makes it worse.

I exhale slowly. “She wrote about things she shouldn’t have known.”

Dean’s brow furrows. “What things?”

I hesitate. “Things I told her.”

His expression shifts. Not judgment, just … understanding.

“Okay,” he says. “So, this isn’t about the book.”

I let out a humorless laugh. “It’s exactly about the book.”

“No,” he says. “It’s about what’s behind it.”

My jaw tightens. “Dean?—”

“What did you tell her?”