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Whoever it was moved strangely, like a marionette whose strings were being tugged by a drunk.

“Looks like someone wandered too close,” Ryder said. “Trespassing signs not big enough for folks now?”

“They’re bigger than your cruiser,” Jett said.

“Not hard,” I added.

Ryder flipped us off.

My eyes lingered on the timestamp.

3:02 a.m. That wasn’t exactly prime time for hikers or locals. When you were out at that time of night…it was for a reason.

“We’ll check it out later,” I said.

The words sounded normal, but there was another feeling stirring in my spine.

Anticipation.

That same dark, bone-deep pull that slid through me every time.

Jett’s gaze flicked to mine. He didn’t say anything, but he felt it, too. That coiled readiness. That hunger.

The three of us had discovered that we shared that instinct years ago, the night we’d walked in on Jett’s stepdad hurting Jett’s sister. It was the night my mother’s lessons stopped working, and the night the world had tilted, and all three of our lives split clean down the center.

We didn’t talk about what we did after. Only that we had done it together. And that something in us had clicked into place while the dust settled and the house went quiet. A brotherhood forged in the one thing we’d all understood without speaking…

Some men didn’t deserve to breathe.

We were very, very good at making sure they didn’t.

Ryder exhaled slowly, as he felt the shift. The wrongness outside and the rightness vibrating under our skin.

“Later,” I repeated, my voice soft as a threat.

And part of me hoped that whatever was waiting out there…would run.

“Want to talk about concussion girl?” Jett mumbled over a mouthful of my eggs a few minutes later.

“Her name’s Sienna,” I said before I could stop myself.

Both men froze—the kind of stillness predators used when they scented new information.

“He’s already on step three in the Sterling Hayes Courtship Protocol,” Ryder commented as he forced another sip of tar-like coffee.

Jett blinked. “What the hell is step one?”

“Stare,” Ryder said, deadpan. “Which he did plenty of yesterday. Step two is brood about it. He’s also nailed that part.”

“It’s not exactly good timing,” Jett muttered.

Ryder flicked a grape at him—hard. It pinged off Jett’s nose with a satisfying little thwap.

“Let the man have a distraction,” Ryder said. “He’s basically forty-seven.”

“I’m thirty,” I growled.

“Same difference,” Ryder muttered, waving a dismissive hand.