Sage shook his head once. “Not like that. I helped him out a while back. Told him if things went bad, he could use it.”
For half a second, something crossed Sage’s face—not grief, not shock. A flicker. Law caught it and almost missed it, a memory passing through. He’d seen men identify brothers before. This wasn’t that. This was recognition of something unfinished.
The coroner nodded. “We’ll confirm the exact cause of death after autopsy, but preliminarily this appears to be homicide by sharp force trauma.”
Sage didn’t move.
Law watched the impact land without a visible fracture. There was no outward collapse, no visible break, but something in him turned inward and stayed there.
Not surprise.
Old history returning the call.
And this time, it hadn’t come alone.
Morning at Nightfall Drifters Ranch never really started quietly.
It started with coffee.
And Cookie.
By four every morning, the ranch house kitchen was already alive—lights on, skillet going, the rich smell of bacon and fresh coffee drifting down the hallway like a promise nobody in the building had the discipline to ignore.
By seven, the place was fully awake.
Sage had been up for hours.
He sat perched on the edge of the long kitchen counter just inside the room, one foot hooked around a stool rung while the other bounced absently against a cabinet door. His laptop glowed in front of him while he skimmed through system logs with quick, precise taps.
Behind him, the ranch kitchen hummed with morning noise.
Cookie moved between the stove and counter like a man who had run the same kitchen for twenty years—though he’d only come to them not long ago from a cattle ranch down in west Texas. A cast-iron skillet hissed on the burner while a second pot of coffee finished brewing.
“Eat something before you break my equipment and cabinet,” Cookie said without looking up.
Sage reached blindly for the toast that appeared beside him.
“Your computer is fine,” he said, already typing again. “I was very gentle with it.”
In truth, he’d finished updating Cookie’s laptop five minutes ago and had moved on to his own.
Across the room, Ramsey was deep into a story that had grown increasingly heroic with every retelling.
“…I’m telling you, the guy came at me with a damn tire iron.”
Memphis snorted from the table. “You mean the guy tripped over a trash can and scared himself.”
“That is not how it happened.”
Ramsey gestured dramatically.
Sage glanced up, squinting at him.
“Was this before or after the tire iron turned into a sword?”
Memphis lost it.
The room erupted.
