Static.
The speaker crackled to life.
Cool. Calm.
“Well, Agent Quinn,” the voice said. “He did come for you.”
Her throat closed.
“He was very brave.”
A pause.
“But brave men don’t always understand structure.”
Her hands tightened around the desk edge.
“Don’t,” she whispered.
“He’s bleeding out in my yard,” Sinclair said.
“And now we can return to the ending.”
Her pulse slammed.
Please let him be alive.
Please.
A soft exhale over the speaker.
“This is what happens,” he said, “when someone interrupts the story.”
The speaker clicked off.
And Tessa stayed crouched behind the overturned desk?—
Shaking.
Listening.
Waiting for another shot that didn’t come.
58
Professor Preston Sinclair
The motion alert flashed across the monitor seconds earlier. He’d seen the deputy drop out of frame and reacted.
In the yard, Sinclair moved fast. He took aim and fired.
The shot had been clean.
He crossed the grass and found Scout where the hedges had broken his fall—twisted near the branches, blood dark against his shoulder.
He pressed two fingers to Scout’s neck.
Counted.
