My gaze flicks toward the front door without my permission, as if danger might be standing just outside it.
“I’ll go to my mom’s. She has a house, it’s quieter—“
“No. Absolutely not.”
“What do you mean, no?” My voice cracks despite my best effort.
“I mean, you don’t take this to her doorstep. They’ll trace you there, too. And then what? You put a target on her back as well?”
The image hits hard—my mother answering the door, unaware, unprotected—and my chest tightens painfully.
I swallow. “Then where?”
“I have an idea, but you’re not going to like it.”
I close my eyes, Julian warm and solid against me, my world narrowed to the sound of Addison’s breathing on the other end of the line.
“Say it.”
“There’s someone you can go to. Someone who was there with us but isn’t on the list.”
My heart starts to pound harder, faster, like it already knows where this is going and is trying to outrun it.
“No. Absolutely not.”
“Kate—“
“No.” I tighten my hold on Julian as if the word itself could build a wall. “You don’t get to say his name like it’s a solution. He disappeared on me. He chose that. How did you even find him?”
“I have my ways,” she deflects. “Point is, I did, and he’s real, Kate. Very real. He’s off-grid, but not unreachable if you know where to look.”
“No,” I whisper again, weaker this time. “I can’t just show up on his doorstep with a baby. His baby and a target on my back.”
“You can if the alternative is worse, and it is.”
Silence stretches between us, filled with the weight of unspoken truths. I think of the way he moved—controlled and efficient. The way danger seemed to bend around him instead of toward him. The way he never promised anything, never offered comfort he couldn’t guarantee.
“His name really is James. Ryder James Morgan.”
Morgan. The name settles into place with a strange, almost inevitable click.
“He looks like a Morgan,” I murmur, the words slipping out before I can stop them.
Addison huffs a quiet, humorless laugh. “I know, right?”
I shake my head, disbelief warring with something far more dangerous—hope.
“You have his address?”
“Yes.”
“And you want me to go there.”
“I want you to live, and I think he’s your best chance.”
“I don’t even know if he’ll help.”
“I do,” Addison replies without hesitation.
