Page 24 of What Comes Around

She gave a harsh laugh. “Really? You are letting them drag me out like an animal?”

Knox did not answer.

“You do not deserve me, Knox Sinclair,” she shouted as the guards guided her into the elevator. “You will regret this.”

Silence settled over the floor once the doors closed.

Titan’s posture eased and he moved back to Knox’s side, settling beside him as if nothing had happened.

Knox turned to me.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Good. You can go home,” he said after a moment. “Finish the report tomorrow. I’ll find out how she got up here and make sure it never happens again.”

I nodded. “Thank you.”

As I gathered my things, I could feel his eyes on me. I didn’t look his way.

Lately he had been watching me more. Studying me.

Like I was some kind of puzzle he intended to solve.

Chapter 8: The Missing DNA

Ava never apologized, and the following week her face was everywhere.

Front pages, headlines, gossip feeds.

“Beloved Actress Caught in Drug Scandal.”

“Private Texts and Party Footage Leak.”

Anonymous sources confirmed long-term cocaine use, party drugs, prescription abuse. Then came the second wave.

Private messages surfaced. Preferences she had clearly never intended to see daylight. A public persona built on elegance suddenly paired with appetites she had carefully kept hidden.

The internet did what it always did. It devoured her.

By Friday her team released a statement about “mental health struggles” and a “temporary withdrawal from public life.” By Sunday brands had begun distancing themselves. Contracts dissolved. A major film project was “postponed indefinitely.”

I read the articles at my kitchen counter, my coffee cooling beside me.

It seemed Knox Sinclair did not bluff.

Still, Ava’s scandal barely registered compared to what weighed on me.

Three weeks had passed since I had gone home to meet Evan. Three weeks of silence.

Amy had found nothing that suggested Elena was alive. No card activity. No document usage. No hospital records. No border crossings. No digital footprint.

Nothing.

People did not vanish like that unless something had gone terribly wrong.

So I made the call.