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“Then we head to the county morgue.”

“Yep. But I’ve got to make some phone calls.”

“Then let’s go,” Fletcher said as he jumped out of the back of the rig. I followed him.

“You’re driving,” I told him. “I have calls to make.”

Fletcher nodded.

We both climbed into the front of the rig.

I took my phone out of my pocket and stared at the screen for a second.

“Who are you calling?” Fletcher asked.

“Nash. And Simon after that.”

“Shouldn’t you call Sheriff Rivers first?”

“This is big. They set up these fights all the way to Nashville. I don’t have enough info to get them any more than just the recruiter. I’ve got nothing for Nash to hang his hat on yet, and he doesn’t have the resources that Simon does at Onyx Security.”

“But still, Nash is the sheriff. He needs to know this kid was murdered.”

“I know what you’re saying, Fletcher. But here’s the deal—at this point Nash can only shut down the one guy I know, Maurice. Simon could trace who Maurice answers to. But I promise to circle back to Nash.”

“When?” Fletcher was a stubborn son of a bitch.

“Within seventy-two hours. How’s that?”

“I suppose that’s good enough. Now I want to know everything.”

“You will as soon as I tell Simon.”

My thumb hovered over my phone, ready to start things really moving.

These fucks hadn’t just thrown a kid into a cage. They’d cleaned him up, staged his death, and written him off as wreckage.

I was going to make sure they paid. Whether they ended up in a cage of their own, or ended up over the side of a cliff, like Tyler did, either way worked for me.

Chapter Twenty-One

I stared at the blank Bristol board like it might blink first.

It didn’t.

The surface was clean, pristine, unforgiving. No ghosts of old lines. No erased charcoal smudges. Just white space waiting for something to exist.

And for the first time in months, something new wanted to exist.

It wasn’t Oracle’s Silence. It wasn’t Seris or Kael or ruined cities or prophecies spoken into the void. This idea felt lighter somehow. Softer. A different world entirely—one where the stakes weren’t survival, but choice. Where hope didn’t come wrapped in blood and grief.

It had come to me two days after I’d collapsed into Trenda’s arms and sobbed like something feral had finally clawed its way out of my chest.

I picked up my pencil.

The phone rang.

Of course it did.