Page 17 of Silent Shadows

“When does she get here?” I ask.

Maya hesitates. “…soon,” she says.

I close my eyes. Of course she does.

“Alright,” I mutter, pushing off the counter. “Then let’s get moving in the morning. If she’s coming, she’s seeing us in the field. Not sitting around waiting for something to happen.”

Taylor grins. “Now that I like.”

Maya nods, already shifting into planning mode. “I’ll get on it.”

Where Taylor is sharp and electric—two things needed in a driver—Maya is steady and warm. And though I’m not happy, I do appreciate what she’s trying to do.

I stare at the map, tracing the convergence point with my finger.

Maybe this is what we need. Or maybe it’s the thing that breaks it.

Either way…

“We’re not slowing down for her,” I say.

Maya’s dark brown eyes meet my eyes in a friendly challenge. “I wouldn’t expect you to.”

Good. Because if this is happening, she’s stepping into our world.

And I’m not changing how we chase the truth just because someone’s watching.

I zoom in on the map, tracing the convergence point where four states meet, where stories overlap, where patterns start to form if you look close enough.

“Get some rest,” I add, stepping back from the screen. “We’ve got a long drive.”

They start to disperse—Taylor grabs snacks, Jax is still half-focused on his footage, and Maya is already typing out what I know will be a perfectly structured plan.

I linger for a second.

Looking at the Machine and what we’ve built together. With a content sigh, I turn off the monitor, letting the screen go dark.

Tomorrow, we move.

And this time… it needs to lead somewhere.

chapter

three

DAISY

I’ll never admit to anyone, not even Marissa, that I am scared as shit to be out from behind my screen. I’ve been out “in the field” before, but that meant green rooms at concerts or sitting poolside at an A-list celeb’s house. This is, to say the least, very different.

Nervous isn’t the word for it. Not “a little outside my comfort zone.” I am fully, deeply unsettled in a way that makes my stomach feel too tight and my skin too aware of itself. Because for the first time in a very long time, I’m not walking into a room where I already know who I am.

Usually, I arrive as Daisy Bennett. Podcast host. Media personality. The woman with the right questions, the controlled lighting, and the producer in her ear, making sure everything stays polished. I know how to command a room. I know how to make people talk. I know how to stay in control of the narrative even when things go sideways.

But right now?

Right now, I’m standing in the middle of the high desert with a dying phone battery, a suitcase covered in dust, and an Uber receipt so expensive it briefly made me consider hitchhiking the final twenty miles out of spite.

Of course I bonded with the driver, a sweet older man named Mike. He had a daughter my age and looked increasingly concerned the farther we got from civilization.