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Because I know the sound she makes when she’s trying not to laugh at something inappropriate. Because I know she studies anatomy like she’s trying to beat the textbook in personal combat.

Because I met her before I knew who she was.

My office door opens without a knock. Marcus leans in, his expression unusually careful. That alone tells me the day has gotten worse. “You’ve seen it?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“All of it?”

“I’ve seen enough.”

He steps inside and closes the door behind him. “They have her university, Dalton. Someone posted her class schedule too, or what they claim is her schedule.”

My hand tightens around the phone. “That needs to come down.”

“It will. The clinic’s legal team is already trying to contact Chandler’s people, but⁠—”

“But Alester created the problem.”

Marcus exhales. “He announced her publicly. There’s only so much they can claw back now.”

“She should never have been put on display,” I say.

“No argument from me.”

“I’m going to see him.”

Marcus’s expression hardens. “Dalton, that’s a terrible idea.”

“He needs to contain this.”

“He caused this.”

“Then he can fix what he caused.”

By the time I reach Alester Chandler’s estate, there are already photographers outside the gates. Not many, but enough. Two men with cameras stand across the street pretending to smoke. A woman sits in a parked car with her window half-lowered and a long lens resting in her lap. Another man leans against a motorcycle, his helmet hanging from one hand, his phone pointed toward the entrance.

They all turn when my car slows.

For one ugly second, I imagine Maggie arriving here under all those eyes.

My hands tighten on the steering wheel.

One of Alester’s guards steps out from the booth near the gate and recognizes my car. He speaks briefly into an earpiece, watches me with the blank hostility of paid muscle, then waves me through.

The gates open slowly. The estate beyond them looks the same as it always does: huge, immaculate, and completely indifferent to the damage done inside it. The driveway curves through perfectly trimmed hedges and winter-bare trees, leading to a house built to intimidate without needing to raise its voice. Pale stone. Tall windows. Dark roof. Every line of it expensive, controlled, and cold.

A member of staff is already waiting when I step out.

“Dr. Price,” she says, folding her hands in front of her. “Mr. Chandler is in his study.”

I follow her through the foyer, past marble floors and arrangements of white flowers too perfect to look alive. Somewhere deeper in the house, a phone rings once and stops. A maid crosses the hallway carrying a tray and lowers her eyes when she sees me.

The whole house feels alert.

Not chaotic. Never that. Alester would never allow chaos where people could see it.

But alert, yes.