Justin’s face doesn’t change. There’s no flash of anger, no visible reaction at all. Just stone—set and immovable. But I’veknown him long enough to catch the fracture beneath it. His jaw tightens, teeth clicking once, sharp and involuntary.
A tell.
A frustration tic he’s had since the first day I met him. Since before I taught him how to hide his emotions well.
Whatever Silas is telling him, it matters.
Enough to set something off inside him. Enough to shift the air in the room, subtle but unmistakable—like pressure building before a storm breaks.
Justin listens in silence.
And I know, before he says a word, that Daniel Stockton is no longer just a question.
He’s an answer we’re not going to like.
We step out onto the porch, the door closing behind us with a muted thud that seals the noise back inside. The night air hits cold and sharp, but it does nothing to cut the tension coiled in my chest.
Justin exhales hard, the sound uneven, like he’s been holding it in for longer than just the length of the call. He looks at me then, and for the first time since we dragged these men inside, there’s something uncertain flickering beneath his composure.
“Silas didn’t find a Thomas Harding,” he says. “Not traveling to Australia in the timeframe we’re looking at. He widened the search—every manifest, every port, commercial and private. No one by that name left the US.”
I don’t interrupt. I already know this isn’t the worst part.
“Neither did Daniel Stockton,” he continues. “No entry records. No departures. Nothing. And he didn’t show up in any hospital admissions either. Not when the dean claimed he was treated.”
The words settle between us, heavy and wrong.
“You think the dean got his dates mixed up?” I ask him.
Justin’s mouth tightens. “That’s a hell of a mistake to make. Not with events this significant.”
I nod once, the pieces shifting in my head, grinding against each other as they realign. “So Daniel Stockton is a ghost. We know he exists—we’ve seen proof of that. But at some point, he disappears and he doesn’t leave a trail.”
Justin’s gaze drifts back toward the door. Toward the men inside tearing each other apart. “The dean is either lying,” he says, “or hiding something.”
“To protect his son?”
“Possibly. Or he’s worried that if we trace Daniel back here, the truth will put him in prison right alongside the rest of them.” His eyes harden. “Either way, there’s only one way to find out.”
Inside, raised voices bleed through the walls—accusations, denial, panic unraveling into something feral. Delaney and Scott-Evans are already turning on each other, years of shared history evaporating under pressure.
Whatever bond they formed in college didn’t survive adulthood. It didn’t survive the consequences of their evil. And we always knew it would come to this. Pitting them against each other was the only way the truth was ever going to surface.
We step back into the cabin and I close my eyes for half a second as I stand before the men.
When I open them again, Scott-Evans is staring at me like a man drowning who’s just seen the surface move farther away.
“Daniel Stockton,” Justin reminds them where we left off, waiting impatiently for a response.
“What about him?” Delaney rasps, drawing our attention towards him.
“He has nothing to do with this,” Scott-Evans says, and I wonder why he’s so eager to protect the man.
“Then start talking,” I say. “From the beginning.”
Scott-Evans swallows. His bravado is gone now. All that’s left is desperation and something dangerously close to relief.
Delaney watches him, before he lets out a single word of warning.
