Chapter 17
GIDEON
Ifollowed him out the door.
Every muscle in my body screamed to close the distance, to wrap my hands around his throat and finish what the justice system had started.
If Hazel and Maude weren't inside—if I didn't have witnesses who'd already seen too much violence in one lifetime—I would have torn Sam Jarrow's head from his body and thrown the pieces in the marsh for the crabs to pick clean.
The urge was so strong, it made my hands shake.
I'd killed before. Clean kills, sanctioned kills, the kind that came with orders and extraction plans and the cold comfort of righteousness.
But this—this was different. This was personal in a way that made my vision narrow and my breath come too fast. This was the father of the woman I loved, and he'd murdered her mother with his bare hands in a kitchen that probably smelled like coffee and safety until it didn't.
Somehow, impossibly, I held back.
I stood on the porch and watched him walk down the drive, backpack slung over one shoulder, moving with the casual ease of a man who thought he'd won something. He didn't look back. Didn't hurry. Just walked like he had all the time in the world and nowhere urgent to be.
The darkness swallowed him whole at the bend in the road, and still I stood there, fists clenched, jaw aching from how hard I was grinding my teeth.
The night air pressed close, humid and thick with salt. The marsh whispered its secrets. The ocean kept its steady rhythm. Everything was the same as it had been an hour ago, and nothing would ever be the same again.
I forced myself to count. Breathing in for four, out for six. The technique I'd taught Hazel just last night, when her nightmares had clawed her awake. The irony wasn't lost on me—her nightmare had walked through our door wearing her father's face.
When I was sure he wasn't coming back—at least not immediately—I turned and went inside.
The scene stopped me cold.
Hazel was on the floor.
Not sitting. Lying. Flat on her back on the worn hardwood, one arm flung above her head, the other across her stomach. Her eyes were open but unfocused, staring at the ceiling like it held answers she couldn't reach.
Maude knelt beside her with a wet towel, dabbing at Hazel's forehead with the kind of practiced care that came from decades of taking care of people. Her face was tight with worry, mouth pressed into a thin line.
"Hazel," I said, dropping to my knees beside her. My hand found hers automatically, threading our fingers together. Her palm was cold. Too cold.
She didn't respond. Didn't even blink.
"She just—dropped," Maude said, voice shaking for the first time since I'd known her. "Stood up, took two steps, and her legs gave out. I caught her before she hit her head, but—" She pressed the towel to Hazel's temple again. "She's not fainted. She's just—gone somewhere I can't reach."
Shock. I'd seen it before, in the field. The body's way of shutting down when the mind encountered something it couldn't process. A mercy and a danger both.
"Hazel," I tried again, squeezing her hand. "Come back. You're safe. I'm here."
Nothing.
Maude looked up at me, and I saw fear in her eyes—real, sharp fear.
"There's no way they let that man out of jail," she said, the words tumbling out fast and desperate.
"No way. He was sentenced to life, Gideon.
Life. For strangling that sweet girl in front of her daughter.
The judge said he was a danger to society.
They don't just—they can't just let someone like that walk free. "
But they had. He'd been here. Real as the floorboards under my knees. Real as the fear radiating off Hazel in waves I could almost see.
I looked down at her pale face, at the way her chest rose and fell too shallow, at the distant emptiness in her eyes, and something hardened in me. A decision made without conscious thought, the kind that comes from the part of you that knows what needs doing before your brain catches up.
"Stay with her," I said to Maude, already moving. "I'll be right back."
"Where are you—"
"Making a call."
I was out the door before she could ask anything else, phone already in my hand, thumb scrolling to Elias's number. The porch steps creaked under my weight. The night wrapped around me like a second skin.
He answered on the first ring. "Gideon."
No preamble. No small talk. That was one of the things I appreciated about Elias—he understood the language of urgency.
"I need a favor," I said, keeping my voice low and level despite the rage still burning in my chest. "Need you to look up a Sam Jarrow. Samuel, probably. Recently released from prison."
A pause. "What kind of information?"
"Everything. Where he was incarcerated, what he was in for, how he got out, when, why. Parole conditions if he has them. Known associates. Last known address. All of it."
Another pause, longer this time. I could almost hear Elias's mind working, cataloging questions he wouldn't ask because he trusted me enough not to need them answered.
"How soon do you need this?"
"Now."
"Give me ten minutes."
"Make it five."
"Gideon—"
"Five minutes, Elias. Please."
Something in my voice must have told him this wasn't negotiable. "I'll send what I have as I get it," he said. "Check your phone."
The line went dead.
I stood on the porch, phone clutched in my hand, eyes fixed on the dark road where Sam Jarrow had disappeared. The marsh hummed its evening song. A night bird called out, lonely and searching. The world kept turning like nothing had changed, and I wanted to burn it all down.
Two minutes.
Three.
I counted them like heartbeats, like breaths, like the seconds between a trigger pull and impact.
Four minutes.
My phone buzzed.
I looked down at the screen, and Elias's message filled it—text in clean, efficient blocks, the way intel should be delivered.
JARROW, Samuel Thomas DOB: 04/15/1970 (Age 55)
Incarcerated: Potosi Correctional Center, Mineral Point, MO
Conviction: Second-degree murder (plea deal from first-degree)
Sentence: 25 years to life
Victim: Marissa Jarrow (née Bradford), age 34 Method: Manual strangulation
Location: Victim's residence, Chicago, IL
Minor present at scene: Hazel Jarrow (daughter, age 12)
The words hit like bullets.
I read them twice, then a third time, because my brain needed the repetition to make them real. Hazel had been twelve. She'd been there. She'd seen enough that the report noted her presence, which meant—
Christ.
I scrolled down, forcing myself to keep reading.
Arrest: Same day as murder
Trial: 18 months later
Plea: Guilty to second-degree in exchange for 25-year minimum
Time served: 13 years, 4 months
Behavior: Multiple violations early in sentence (assault on inmates, contraband), improved record last 5 years
The timeline aligned with what Hazel had said, with the nightmare she'd described. Her mother died when she was twelve. Sam had been locked up for thirteen years. The math was brutal and clean.
But nothing explained why he was free now.
Another message came through before I could finish processing the first.
Released: Yesterday, 11:47 PM
Flight: Kansas City to Charleston, arrived 9:23 AM today
Parole status: NOT ELIGIBLE - next hearing scheduled in 2 years
Current location: UNKNOWN
My gut sank like a stone in deep water.
Yesterday. He'd been released less than twenty-four hours ago, and by this morning he was on a plane to Charleston. Not back to Chicago where the murder happened. Not to wherever he'd lived before. Straight here. To Kiawah. To Hazel.
And he shouldn't have been released at all. Wasn't eligible for another two years.
The phone buzzed again.
Still searching for release authorization. No parole hearing on record. He wasn't due for review. Records show early release but no documentation of WHY. Something's off here. Give me more time.
I read the message three times, the dread in my chest spreading like ice water through my veins.
Someone had let him out early. Without proper procedure. Without the hearing he was supposed to have. And less than twelve hours later, he'd shown up at the one place Hazel had finally started to feel safe.
This wasn't about amends or reconciliation or whatever bullshit he'd tried to sell us over dinner.
This was deliberate.
I thought about the new backpack. The cheap clothes. The crumpled hundred-dollar bill. A man released from prison with just enough resources to get exactly where he needed to go.
I thought about the way he'd asked for the owner. The way he'd looked at Hazel like he'd been expecting to find her here.
Fuck.
I should have killed him when I had the chance. Should have dragged him into the marsh and held him under until the bubbles stopped. Should have done what I was trained to do—eliminate the threat before it could strike.
But I'd hesitated. I'd thought about Hazel's face, about Maude's shock, about the way violence stains a place and the people in it. I'd chosen restraint over action.
And now Sam Jarrow was out there, somewhere in the dark, and I had no idea what he was planning or who had let him out or how much danger Hazel was really in.
Everything had just changed.
The calm I'd felt this morning—measuring trim, kissing Hazel in the kitchen, talking about paint colors like we had all the time in the world—seemed like something from another life. A dream I'd been allowed to have for exactly long enough to make losing it hurt.
I looked back at the house. Light spilled warm from the windows. Inside, Hazel was still on the floor, still somewhere I couldn't reach her. Maude was still trying to coax her back with damp towels and soft words.
And I was out here on the porch, holding a phone full of information that made everything worse.
Another message came through.
Found something. Release wasn't standard procedure. Special paperwork pushed through administrative channels. Still trying to identify who authorized it. This doesn't feel right, Gideon. Be careful.
I stared at the words until they blurred.
Special paperwork.
Someone had wanted Sam Jarrow released. Had expedited it. Had put him on a plane to Charleston the same morning he walked out of prison.
Someone who knew about Hazel. About the inn. About where to find her.
The pieces started fitting together in my mind, but the picture they made had gaps I couldn't fill yet. Why now? Why him? Why here?
I didn't have answers. But I knew one thing with absolute certainty: this was far from over.
Men like Sam Jarrow didn't walk away. They circled. They waited. They found the moment when you thought you were safe, and then they struck.
I'd seen it before. I'd hunted men like him in a dozen countries, through jungles and cities and mountain passes. I knew the pattern. Knew the tells.
The rage that swept through me then was clean and cold and absolute. The kind of fury that didn't shake or shout. The kind that calculated trajectories and chose weapons and planned three moves ahead.
I'd been dulled by happiness. By peace. By the fantasy that I could have this—could have her—without consequence.
But consequence had found me, anyway.
And now I had a choice to make.
I could call Elias back. Could ask for extraction, for reinforcements, for someone else to handle this so I could get Hazel somewhere safe and far from here.
Or I could stay. Could dig in. Could use every skill I'd learned in a dozen dark places to protect her from whatever was coming.
It wasn't really a choice.
I'd told Hazel I was here. That I showed up. That I didn't hide.
I'd meant it.
I looked down at my phone one more time, at the messages still coming through from Elias, at the growing file of information about a murderer who should still be in prison.
Then I turned and walked back inside, where Hazel needed me more than my rage did.
For now.
But Sam Jarrow had made a mistake coming here. He'd shown his face. Made himself visible.
And when the time came—and it would come—I'd be ready.