Page 110 of Creeping Lily

15 years. Blonde, green eyes.

Taken from Studio City Cinemas.

Sold to: Lambert Corp (Re: Oscar Ellison)”

“Third August 1999

Malisan Hernandez, 13 Forecall Road, Cathine

12 years, dark brown hair, brown eyes.

Taken from Vili Road on way home from school, red bicycle

Sold to: Markham Estate (Re: Peter Markham)”

“Eighth November 1999

Baby Owen

Newborn, swapped out with deceased newborn at Mercy Xavier General Hospital

Sold to: Senator Tom Walker”

I read the passage again,slower this time, letting each word burn itself into my brain. My eyes flick back to the date, tracing the faded ink like maybe I’ve read it wrong. I go over every line, every jagged curve of handwriting, dissecting it as if peeling apart the truth will make it less real.

It can’t be.

The odds are impossible… aren’t they?

But the timeline fits. Too well. My chest tightens. My thoughts spiral—no, no, no. How could it be?

The air leaves my lungs in one sharp, hollow rush, like I’ve been sucker-punched. My fingers go numb. I snap the ledger shut, the sound cracking through the quiet room. My hands won’t stop shaking as I lower it toward the side table. I almostmiss, the book tilting, threatening to slide to the floor. At the last second I steady it, pushing it back into place like that will somehow push the truth away too.

Then I sink into the chair, staring at nothing, my pulse thudding in my ears. My mind is a storm—snatches of memory, pieces of conversation, old wounds tearing open. And underneath it all, a whisper I can’t silence:

If it’s true…

By the time Titan returns,I’ve gone cover to cover. Every last page. Every last name. I didn’t just skim—I devoured the ledger like it might vanish if I stopped. Some of the names were whispers I’d heard in passing, others were impossible to ignore—untouchable figures, celebrated faces, people who lived in headlines and history books. But here, in these cramped pages, they were stripped down to the truth: high-profile predators swimming in the same gutters as the dregs of humanity.

Deals in backrooms. Innocence traded like currency. Souls sold for a taste of power.

The world, I realize, isn’t just cruel—it’s rotting from the inside out.

He doesn’t say a word at first. Just stands in the doorway, one hand braced against the frame, his eyes fixed on the ledger sitting beside me. If he truly hadn’t wanted me to read it, he wouldn’t have left it behind. And if he didn’t know I’d give in to my curiosity, he wouldn’t have vanished for hours, leaving me alone with it. No—this was intentional. He wanted me to see. Maybe evenneededme to.

“You must be hungry,” he says at last, stepping inside and closing the door with a quiet click.

He moves toward the kitchen, and I shake my head, thoughhis back is turned. Hunger feels foreign right now. If I wanted food, I could’ve found it myself. He knows that.

“You okay with four bean salad?” he asks over his shoulder.

“I’m not hungry.”

I push myself up from the chair and cross to stand beside him. For the first time since meeting him, something inside me shifts—not fear, not wariness, but a raw thread of sympathy winding through my ribs. The horrors this man has seen…

Hearing about them was one thing. Reading them—living inside their details—plants them deeper, into the marrow where they ache like old wounds.

The Walkers. Their name bleeds across the page in my mind. Knowing they were part of this sickness is one thing; knowing the truth about their child is another. That he wasn’t theirs at all. That he was stolen—ripped from his mother’s arms while she bled and broke in the aftermath of birth. That she was told her baby had died.