Chapter Fourteen
One day later…
Sage hit the alley at a full sprint.
Cold air burned his lungs, sharp, his boots slamming hard against uneven pavement as he drove forward. Noise snapped around him—footsteps, breath, someone shouting behind him—but it all blurred at the edges.
Focus locked ahead.
Movement.
There—
A figure cut hard through the shadows, fast enough to disappear between one blink and the next.
Too smooth. Too controlled.
Familiar.
“Left,” he snapped, already adjusting.
He didn’t wait to see who followed.
They would.
They always did.
Sage took the turn tight, shoulder brushing brick, barely feeling it as he pushed harder. The alley narrowed, cluttered—dumpster, broken pallet, spill of trash—and he threaded through it without slowing.
The guy ahead didn’t hesitate.
Didn’t stumble.
That registered.
“Two exits,” Sage called, breath steady, mind already mapping. “One dead, one open.”
Bootsteps thundered behind him—closer now.
Law.
He didn’t look back.
Didn’t need to.
“Open goes to the street,” Sage added.
The figure ahead chose it.
Of course he did.
Sage shifted direction without breaking stride, cutting angle instead of distance, driving for the intercept. His focus narrowed as everything else fell away—no noise, no distraction, just movement and timing.
The guy vaulted a low barrier. Sage followed, landing and already moving again.
No wasted motion, and the distance didn’t close—
which was the problem.
Sage narrowed his eyes, tracking the rhythm of the run ahead of him.
Too even.
Too intentional.
Like the guy knew exactly where he was going.
Sage caught a glimpse of his face.
Rook.
“Son of a bitch,” Sage muttered. Ahead, the figure cut right into a cluttered stretch of alley—laundry strung overhead, sheets and shirts hanging low, blocking the sun and breaking the light into shifting patches of shadow.
Sage leaned into the turn—
—and pushed.
The alley tightened as he drove into it, sunlight filtering through fabric and lines, flashing and cutting across his path, turning everything uneven—light, shadow, movement—until the space narrowed to shape, motion, and instinct.
He didn’t slow.
His focus shifted instead, tracking the movement ahead through the space—shouts cutting down the alley, voices calling direction as the runner stayed fast and deliberate, still not breaking stride, still not sloppy.
Sage adjusted on the fly, cutting left, then right, following the path.
There—
A flicker of movement ahead, just enough to lock onto—a few young men falling out of the runner’s way.
He drove harder, closing the angle, pushing for the intercept—
—and Rook just… vanished.
Not a stumble. Not a missed step.
Gone.
Sage hit his brake a fraction too late, boots skidding before he caught himself, his gaze already sweeping the space in front of him.
At first glance, it looked like a building wall.
It wasn’t.
He moved around people, his eyes tracking fast—wall, fence, stacked crates—until it clicked.
A gap.
Narrow enough to disappear if you didn’t know it was there, just wide enough for someone who did.
“Shit,” Sage muttered, already moving again.
He hit it at speed, turning sideways to slip through, shoulder brushing rough wood as he forced his way past—
—and broke out onto another street.
Empty.
No movement. No sound. No trace of the man who’d been there seconds ago.
Sage stopped short, chest rising once, sharp but even, as his gaze swept the space—parked cars, rooftops, shadow lines, every possible exit point mapped and discarded just as fast.
Winter’s voice cut through the comms, calm and certain.
“I’ve got this.”
Sage stilled.
“Don’t kill him,” he said.
“Trust me,” Winter said.
Sage exhaled slowly through his nose, forcing his focus to reset, even as his eyes stayed on the space where Rook had disappeared.
“Copy.”
The word came easy. The rest didn’t.
Why the fuck had Rook been here?
Sage’s jaw tightened slightly as the pattern settled into place.
“Yeah,” he said under his breath, more to himself than anyone else. “You planned this.”
The street stayed empty.
Sage didn’t move far from where he’d stopped.
For a few seconds, no one said anything. Just breath and movement and the faint hum of conversations and distant traffic bleeding in from somewhere beyond the block.
He shifted a step to the side, giving himself a better angle on the street, eyes still working the space even as the rest of the team closed in around him—Rip first, then Boston, Micah right behind, Black slipping in without sound like he’d been there the whole time.
Law came in last.
Not rushing.
Not loud.
Just quiet, steady.
Close enough that Sage felt it before he saw it, that subtle shift in space that didn’t crowd but didn’t leave room either.
Grounding.
Sage didn’t look at him.
Didn’t need to.
“He’s gone?” Boston asked, already scanning the street like the guy might reappear out of spite.
“He disappeared,” Sage said, voice steady.
Boston snorted. “That’s a fancy way of saying the same thing.”
“No,” Micah cut in, tone sharper. “It’s not.”
Sage let his gaze track the line of parked cars again, replaying it in his head, step by step.
“He knew that gap was there,” he said. “Didn’t hesitate. Didn’t check. Just took it.”
Micah glanced back toward the alley.
“So, he knows the area.”
“Yeah,” Sage said.
Black shifted his weight, eyes moving over the rooftops, the windows, the blind corners.
Law stepped in closer—not enough to draw attention, just enough that his shoulder lined up with Sage’s, his presence settling there like it belonged.
“We almost had him,” Law said.
Sage huffed a quiet breath, something dry in it. “Almost doesn’t count.”
“No,” Law said. “It tells you what he is.”
That pulled Sage’s focus sideways for a second.
Not away.
Just… adjusted.
“Which is?” Boston asked, already impatient.
Sage didn’t answer.
He let the pattern settle fully, every turn, every choice, every second of control lining up the way it had felt in motion.
“Trained,” he said finally.
Somewhere over the comms, there was a faint shift of static—movement, distance—then nothing.
Winter hadn’t come back on yet.
Sage’s eyes flicked once toward the direction he’d gone, then back to the street.
Law didn’t move.
Didn’t step away.
Sage could feel him there, steady and unshaken, that same quiet presence that hadn’t broken even when everything else had shifted.
Different from the run.
Different from before.
But not separate.
Sage exhaled slowly, letting the last of the chase burn off.
“Yeah,” he said, mostly to himself.
Then, a little louder—
“He chose this alley.”
That got everyone’s attention.
Even Boston stopped talking.
Sage finally turned his head, just enough to catch Law in his peripheral.
Not looking fully.
Just enough.
“Because he knew exactly how to get out of it.”
“Come on,” Law murmured. “Let’s see who he left behind.”
The crime scene was busy when they came back to it.
Harsh white sunlight cut across the yard, spilling through the open doorway of the small house and casting hard, unforgiving shadows along the ground. Phoenix PD still had it locked down—tape up, uniforms posted, radios low but constant in the background.
Same as before.
Only this time, the adrenaline from the chase hadn’t burned off.
He stepped back inside—
the crime scene.
Smell hit him again—metallic, heavy, still fresh enough to sit wrong in the back of his throat.
Chalk lines outlined the body’s position halfway between a couch and the kitchen island.
Died right where he dropped, if Sage had to guess.
Memphis moved off to the left, already scanning the perimeter. Rip angled right. Boston hovered just behind, quieter now but still watching everything. Black disappeared toward the outer edge of the scene, checking lines of sight.
Law stayed at his side when he took the last few steps and stopped.
One of the cops spoke, handing him a file. “Here’s the crime scene photos of the body.”
Sage flipped it open. For a second, it was just a body.
Male. Late twenties, maybe early thirties. Thin frame. Street clothes—worn, layered, nothing that didn’t blend. One arm twisted under him at a bad angle, face turned slightly toward the light.
Then it shifted.
Recognition didn’t hit all at once.
It came in pieces.
The shape of the jaw. The line of the mouth. Something in the eyes—even half-lidded, even gone.
Sage’s focus narrowed.
He gazed at the photos, letting the details line up against memories that hadn’t been called up in years.
A corner. A winter that never seemed to end. Running jobs for food. Sleeping where you could.
A face in the blur of it.
Not close.
Not important.
Just—
there.
“Another lost boy,” Sage whispered.
The words came out flat. Not for anyone else.
Law heard him anyway and stepped closer. “You sure?”
Sage exhaled once through his nose, gaze still on the file.
“He ran with us for a bit,” he added, voice just as low. “Didn’t stick around long.”
Boston shifted behind him. “You know him?”
“Knew him,” Sage said.
Past tense.
Memphis glanced over, reading the tone more than the words. “Name?”
Sage nodded once. “Cain,” he said quietly.
Law’s voice came in low, close. “From when you were kids?”
Sage didn’t answer right away.
He let the pieces settle.
His gaze hardened slightly, not outward—focused inward, tightening around the pattern.
Law crouched, pulling a creased photo from beneath the chair. He handed it to Sage.
Cain stood in it. Alive. Still.
Next to him stood the man from the alley.
Rook.
Sage’s jaw tightened.
Something about this didn’t track.