"Don't ring," the intercom said—then it said, "Enter."
"Flynn Leroy?" Brielle's voice came out thin through the metal grille. Rain had started, small and impatient. She held the umbrella like a shield.
"Who's asking?" came the single-syllable reply.
"My name is Brielle Vorobyov. Nathan Griffin is my father. I—" She stopped herself. Pleading was a bad look. "I need to join your next run to Southvale."
A click. Static. "Most of what people show me are fakes," Flynn said.
"He's not—" Brielle began.
"Then tell me why I should believe you."
She dug a wrist under her sleeve and showed him the red thread tied to a jagged gray shard. "He left this on my birthday." Her fingers shook. "He wrote coordinates on the back of a postcard. He sent me to the Southvale Range. He didn't come back."
The intercom lit. "You think that proves anything?"
Brielle swallowed. "I don't have anything else."
"Come in," Flynn said.
The gate unlatched with a clunk. Brielle stepped onto the gravel path, boots sinking. The villa sat on a hill like a stubborn old thing, dark wood and glass, an aggressive bonsai in a rusted pot on the porch. A shape moved inside, then another voice—quiet, human—said, "Flynn, who's at the gate?"
"Someone with a grief complex and a souvenir," Flynn answered.
The front door opened before Brielle could knock. A man in a dark coat was descending the foyer steps
