I forced myself to count. Breathing in for four, out for six. The technique I'd taught Hazel just last night, when her nightmares had clawed her awake. The irony wasn't lost on me—her nightmare had walked through our door wearing her father's face.
When I was sure he wasn't coming back—at least not immediately—I turned and went inside.
The scene stopped me cold.
Hazel was on the floor.
Not sitting. Lying. Flat on her back on the worn hardwood, one arm flung above her head, the other across her stomach. Her eyes were open but unfocused, staring at the ceiling like it held answers she couldn't reach.
Maude knelt beside her with a wet towel, dabbing at Hazel's forehead with the kind of practiced care that came from decades of taking care of people. Her face was tight with worry, mouth pressed into a thin line.
"Hazel," I said, dropping to my knees beside her. My hand found hers automatically, threading our fingers together. Her palm was cold. Too cold.
She didn't respond. Didn't even blink.
"She just—dropped," Maude said, voice shaking for the first time since I'd known her. "Stood up, took two steps, and her legsgave out. I caught her before she hit her head, but—" She pressed the towel to Hazel's temple again. "She's not fainted. She's just—gone somewhere I can't reach."
Shock. I'd seen it before, in the field. The body's way of shutting down when the mind encountered something it couldn't process. A mercy and a danger both.
"Hazel," I tried again, squeezing her hand. "Come back. You're safe. I'm here."
Nothing.
Maude looked up at me, and I saw fear in her eyes—real, sharp fear. "There's no way they let that man out of jail," she said, the words tumbling out fast and desperate. "No way. He was sentenced to life, Gideon. Life. For strangling that sweet girl in front of her daughter. The judge said he was a danger to society. They don't just—they can't just let someone like that walk free."
But they had. He'd been here. Real as the floorboards under my knees. Real as the fear radiating off Hazel in waves I could almost see.
I looked down at her pale face, at the way her chest rose and fell too shallow, at the distant emptiness in her eyes, and something hardened in me. A decision made without conscious thought, the kind that comes from the part of you that knows what needs doing before your brain catches up.
"Stay with her," I said to Maude, already moving. "I'll be right back."
"Where are you?—"
"Making a call."
I was out the door before she could ask anything else, phone already in my hand, thumb scrolling to Elias's number. The porch steps creaked under my weight. The night wrapped around me like a second skin.
He answered on the first ring. "Gideon."
No preamble. No small talk. That was one of the things I appreciated about Elias—he understood the language of urgency.
"I need a favor," I said, keeping my voice low and level despite the rage still burning in my chest. "Need you to look up a Sam Jarrow. Samuel, probably. Recently released from prison."
A pause. "What kind of information?"
"Everything. Where he was incarcerated, what he was in for, how he got out, when, why. Parole conditions if he has them. Known associates. Last known address. All of it."
Another pause, longer this time. I could almost hear Elias's mind working, cataloging questions he wouldn't ask because he trusted me enough not to need them answered.
"How soon do you need this?"
"Now."
"Give me ten minutes."
"Make it five."
"Gideon—"
