Chapter Twenty-Two - Markian
The car rattles as it creeps down the cracked street, headlights casting harsh, yellow light on the battered mailbox and the weathered Victorian ahead. I roll down the window, the night air heavy with salt and the faint rot of seaweed left to fester beneath the pier.
Lui is already out, hands in his pockets, eyes sharp. The porch light flickers above his head, casting strange shadows on the peeling trim and the sagging steps.
The house tilts toward the road, every board and windowpane tired from decades of wind and neglect.
My boots hit the pavement with purpose as I step out, scanning the empty street, every sense alert. This place could be any of a dozen dead ends, but I feel it in my bones. This time, the trail is real.
We approach the door. Lui knocks, three short raps. I stand behind him, jaw set, shoulders squared. For a heartbeat, nothing moves. Then the latch clicks and the door swings wide, spilling a thin rectangle of light onto the porch.
Inside, the house is a tomb of lemon polish and old secrets.
Faded wallpaper peels at the corners, a grandfather clock ticks slow and steady somewhere out of sight.
We’re greeted by Mrs. Granger herself: old as driftwood, white hair pinned up tight, her eyes a steely blue that’s seen too much.
She waves us in, the rings on her fingers catching the low light.
We follow her down a narrow hall. My boots echo off the hardwood, the walls close around us. The parlor is cramped, filled with sagging armchairs and doilies that smell faintly of dust and sunlight.
Mrs. Granger settles into her throne by the fire, eyeing us over her spectacles with the lazy patience of someone who’s seen her share of men with questions and nowhere else to go.
I lower my voice, keep it steady but unmistakable. “You rented a room to a woman. Blonde, short. Mid-twenties.”
She leans back, eyes narrowing. “Lot of lost souls pass through here, sonny. But I remember her. She was skittish. Jumped every time a car went by.” Her voice is raspy, but there’s a trace of kindness behind it, something I can’t quite place.
Lui steps in, polite but firm. “Did she leave anything behind? Any notes? Forwarding address?”
Mrs. Granger snorts. “No, just memories. Sweet girls, those kids. The little one loved my old cat—followed her around all day, tried to feed her bits of toast when she thought I wasn’t looking.
” She glances at me, lips pressed tight.
“One day, they just vanished. Packed up in the night, real quiet. No goodbyes. Didn’t even finish her last week’s rent. ”
Girls. Plural. She has two children. Who else has she fucked?
My hand is tight around my phone, knuckles white as bone. I take in every word, every flicker of her gaze. There’s nothing in her voice but nostalgia and a touch of pity. No fear. No deception. I trust my gut, and it tells me she’s telling the truth.
As Mrs. Granger describes Jessa—her haunted eyes, the way she clung to the girls in crowds, how she’d spend hours watching the street from her window—something sharp coils inside me.
Rage, first. She’s still outmaneuvering me, always two steps ahead, always ready to vanish.
She’s taught the girls to do the same. I can almost picture them: two little ghosts in threadbare dresses, playing on the porch, never quite belonging.
Beneath the anger is something uglier. Jealousy. Did she run alone, or did she find someone else? Some gentle, soft-spoken man who helps tuck the children into bed, teaches them to ride a bike, laughs with her over dinner?
I grit my teeth, the image crawling under my skin. If he’s there when I find her—if he thinks he can take what’s mine—I’ll put a bullet through his skull. No hesitation.
“She seemed happy?” I ask, voice coming out harsher than I intend.
Mrs. Granger studies me, her gaze lingering a beat too long.
“She was scared, but the girls… they were happy enough. Kids are like weeds, you know. They grow wherever they’re planted.
” She sighs, the fire reflecting in her eyes.
“She was always looking over her shoulder. Like she knew the world wasn’t done with her yet. ”
I nod, lips pressed tight. My jaw aches from the tension. I don’t move, don’t let my eyes stray from hers, afraid she’ll slip something vital if I look away.
Lui takes down notes, but I barely hear him. My mind spins—dead ends, years wasted, every night spent hunting, every friend and enemy burned in the pursuit of a ghost.
This is real. This is close. I can feel it. The war is almost over.
As Mrs. Granger’s voice trails off, the room feels colder. The only sound is the ticking of the clock, and the rush of blood in my ears.
“She had another kid?” The thought needles at me again. “Did she… did she ever mention someone else? A man?”
The old woman shakes her head, a hint of a smile on her lips. “No, sonny. She was alone. Or wanted to be.”
I sit back, unclenching my fists. “Thank you,” I say, the words rough in my throat.
She only nods. “If she was running from someone, I hope you’re not him.”
I let that hang in the air as Lui stands. I thank her again and walk out, leaving the parlor and its ghosts behind.
In the car, I lean back and stare through the windshield at the town lights blurring past. My jaw tightens. The rage is there, burning. Something sharper cuts through it—regret, longing, the ache of everything I’ve missed. I picture Jessa’s face, the kids’ laughter, the years I can never get back.
I swear to myself: whoever helped her hide, whoever cost me my family, will pay.
For now, the hunt is on again. The trail is warm. This time, I won’t stop until I bring them home.
I step out into the thick, humid dark, the door slamming shut behind me with a sound that echoes off the silent street.
The world here feels paused, suspended, as if it’s holding its breath for what comes next.
The air is heavy with the scent of brine, rotting kelp, and something metallic underneath.
I lean against the side of the car, feeling the night press against my skin, eyes burning with exhaustion and something sharper.
Lui hangs back, arms folded, watching but not approaching. He knows me well enough to give me space when I need it, to let me stew in the storm I carry everywhere. I close my eyes, let the darkness settle around me, and replay the old woman’s words in my head.
“She was skittish. Jumped at every sound. Packed up in the middle of the night, no goodbyes.”
Three and a half years, and all I have are scraps. Ghost stories. Every lead I’ve ever had, every trail, every risk, every burned bridge, just so I could walk into a parlor full of dust and memory, and hear that she’s slipped through my fingers again.
I get into the passenger’s seat, slam the door hard enough to make the glass shiver. My hands go to my thighs, gripping until it hurts. For a long moment I just sit there, the engine off, the city lights blurring across the windshield.
My mind won’t quiet. It keeps turning back, always, to Jessa: her face lit by lamplight, her body pressed against mine, the secrets she kept even then. I remember the feeling of her slipping away, the ache that’s never dulled.
Jealousy twists in my gut, bitter as bile. I picture her in the boarding house—alone, or was she? Did she meet someone new in some shitty coastal town? Did some gentle, useless man learn to make her smile, help raise my daughter alongside his own, slip into the space I left behind?
I see him in my mind’s eye. He could be tall, kind-eyed, the sort of man who reads bedtime stories, who holds her when she cries. My daughter—my blood—might have called him Daddy.
A laugh breaks free, short and vicious. I can’t decide what hurts more: the idea of another man touching her, or the bone-deep knowledge that I missed everything.
Their first steps. Their first words. Birthdays, Christmas mornings, lost teeth, every quiet moment of comfort or chaos. I wasn’t there for any of it.
Instead, I was waging wars. I was hunting ghosts, burning down everything I had left for a family that vanished before I could even hold them close.
No one touches what’s mine. No one beds my woman. If he laid a hand on her—if he thought for a second he could replace me—he’s dead. Simple as that.
I dig my nails into my thigh, breathing slow and hard, willing the world to stop spinning for just a minute. The rage and regret are tangled together, impossible to unravel. I’m not sure which is worse: the heat of jealousy or the cold ache of loss.
Lui finally slides into the driver’s seat, closing the door quietly. He doesn’t speak right away. Instead, he pulls out his phone, scrolling through something, probably already gathering new intel. When he finally speaks, his voice is measured, steady—a rope thrown to a drowning man.
“She didn’t leave a trace,” Lui says, still looking at the screen. “No forwarding address. No contact information. A few people in the next town over described a woman matching her. Blonde, two girls. I’ll pull surveillance. Start leaning on locals. Someone saw something.”
I nod, jaw tight, gaze locked on the darkness ahead. “No mistakes, Lui. No loose ends. If anyone gets in our way, they disappear.”
He meets my eyes, and for a second, something passes between us. Respect, warning, understanding. He nods, slipping his phone away. “Understood.”
Lui drives, and I stare ahead at the lights smearing past the glass. Streetlights flicker over my face, casting hard shadows, the taste of salt and exhaust sharp in the air. The moment shifts inside me. For three years I’ve been the hunter, the ghost.
Tonight, that ends. I feel the steel settle in my spine. This isn’t just about finding her anymore; it’s war. I’m not waiting for another rumor or another lead. No more patience, no more mercy. The old rules don’t matter. I am taking back what’s mine.