And, really, I didn’t want Knox to be doing those things for me. The guy had to worry about surviving, and it’s not like he made money in the penitentiary. So, how he was doing that, I had no idea, but if it wasn’t Knox, then who?
“You know,” I started, “I don’t think I’ve ever properly thanked you.” I studied his profile. He had a sharp jaw, the kind of focused intensity that probably served him well in courtrooms. “For everything you’re doing for Knox. For … staying.”
Knox’s college friend. A guy who became a criminal defense attorney. I wondered if that career decision was rooted in the trauma of seeing his friend hauled off to prison. You go to college to study and maybe play beer pong, not watch one of your closest friends get hauled off in cuffs.
“The day Knox was arrested …” Ryker’s voice caught. “It’s like watching innocence die. You’re young, think the world’s your oyster, that life just keeps getting better and better.”
The prison loomed ahead, all concrete and razor wire. A monument to broken dreams.
“I know plenty of people go through hell,” he continued. “Blake and Faith survived a dark side of the foster system. But watching Knox get convicted of murder?” He shook his head. “Nothing compares to that.”
He pulled into a parking space between a rusted Honda and a pickup truck held together by duct tape. The visitors lot toldits own story of families scraping together gas money to see their locked-up loved ones.
I twisted my fingers until they ached. “I hate talking about it.”
“Hard to face what someone’s done.” His voice gentled. “But your brother’s still a good man, Dakota.”
Right. A good man who happened to have killed someone.
Before the arrest, Knox had been the golden boy. All-American kid from an all-American family, clawing our way toward upper-middle-class respectability. We weren’t the Cleavers, but we weren’t the cautionary tale either.
Normal families don’t breed killers.
Or so I’d thought.
“It’s hard for you to see him,” Ryker realized, walking beside me toward the first checkpoint.
The prison stretched before us. Gray walls topped with coils of razor wire that caught the sun like broken glass. Beyond those walls, the yard sprawled with inmates and guards, whose rifles glinted from watchtowers. The air smelled like industrial disinfectant and something else. Fear maybe.
“Every time I see him …” I swallowed hard. “Something breaks inside me.”
Because I still saw him at seven, thunder-crashing through the hallway in his Hot Wheels pajamas, hair sticking up in twelve directions as he dove for the Christmas tree. His small hands would tear through wrapping paper.
Then there was the summer he turned nine and declared himself the official Frog Relocation Specialist. Every Saturday, he’d spend an extra hour and a half moving every single frog out of the mower’s path before starting his lawn duty. Dad would find him crouched in the grass, cupping some tiny creature in his palms, whispering reassurances as he carried it to safety by the pond.
“They’re just trying to live their lives, Dakota,” Knox had said. “They don’t deserve to die because I need to cut grass.”
Now that same compassionate boy sat behind bars, shoulders broad with muscle he’d built to survive, ink crawling up his arms, telling stories I didn’t want to know. The shell he’d grown was thick enough to stop bullets.
“At least it’s not maximum security,” Ryker reminded me, pulling me back to the present. “If he’d been sent to one of those places …”
He didn’t finish. Didn’t need to.
The first metal detector beeped as we passed through. A guard with dead eyes and coffee breath waved us forward. Next came the pat-down, the surrender of our IDs, the slow shuffle through corridors that echoed with the slam of distant doors.
“How much longer will he be in here?” I asked as we waited for the final clearance.
Ryker’s lips thinned. “I’m working on it.”
“He hasn’t seen his daughter in years.”
She’d been born when he was still in high school. Unplanned, but never unwanted. In fact, after she arrived, she became his everything. He’d matured overnight, stepping up immediately and building his whole future around her. College wasn’t about finding himself or partying; it was about creating a life stable enough to support a family. Because that was Knox. Every decision filtered through how it would affect the people he loved.
When he got arrested, his ex had been understanding. Theoretically committed to maintaining Knox’s relationship with their daughter.
Until she wasn’t.
“It scares me,” I admitted, voice dropping to a whisper as we approached the visiting room. “He’s getting harder. More hopeless. What if he does something stupid because he thinks he has nothing left to lose?”
