Page 11 of Priest

“She knew what she was doing.”

His eyes sharpen slightly. “That’s the first useful thing you’ve given me in weeks.”

I go still.

He keeps his tone even, but there’s something working behind his eyes now. Calculation. “Could be medical. Nurse. Doctor. EMT. Something close enough that she knows skin, supplies, how to stay calm when there’s blood.”

“Then check hospitals.”

“I can start,” he says. “But without a last name, that’s not a door. It’s a wall with a thousand windows. Staff directories aren’t always public. Transfers don’t always show fast. If she left one hospital and went to another under her legal name, I still need the legal name to match her. Blue won’t get me far.”

I step closer. “Make it get you farther.”

He looks at me for a long second.

Not challenging.

Not backing down either.

“I’m trying, Prez.”

The quiet lands harder than if he’d shouted.

“She didn’t leave much,” he says. “And what she did leave doesn’t point anywhere useful. She kept her life compartmentalized. So did you.” He pauses. “Difference is, she was better at it, hate saying it,” he says quietly, “but you may have to face the fact that we don’t find her unless she slips.”

I grab the credit card machine off the counter and throw it.

It smashes into the far wall and explodes into plastic and wires, the sound loud and final in the quiet shop.

“I’m not facing a goddamn thing,” I roar. “You find her, Ghost. You do whatever the fuck you have to do and you find her.”

He doesn’t flinch. That almost makes it worse.

“I am,” he says quietly. “But right now, all I’ve got is a woman named Blue who knew how to become smoke before she ever knew someone would come looking.”

The words sit there between us, heavy and undeniable.

Before I can respond, the bell over the door jingles.

I freeze.

Sadie walks in like she belongs here, black dress tight and deliberate, one hand resting just below her belly like she’s already practicing how to be seen. She takes in the broken machine, the tension vibrating through the room, my barely leashed temper—and smiles anyway.

Ghost mutters something under his breath that sounds like a prayer gone wrong.

Of course.

Ever since Blue disappeared, Sadie’s been everywhere. The clubhouse. The shop. Lingering too close. Touching too often. Clinging like a leech I can’t pry off without blood.

I clear my throat. “Sadie. What can I do for you?”

She tilts her head, voice soft and sweet. “Priest, sugar? I’ve got a baby doctor appointment this afternoon, and I was hopin’ you could take me.”

The word baby scrapes. Not because of what it is—but because of how she uses it.

Ghost exhales sharply behind me.

“Sadie,” I say slowly, “it’s pretty obvious I work today. Can’t one of the prospects take you?”