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W ith my gun leading the way, I navigate the basement stairs of an old house I don’t remember entering. Shadows call to me in voices from the past. People I’ve lost, loved…failed. The staircase is never-ending, growing darker as I go. Even so, I descend further into my doom.

A hand shoots out between steps, locking onto my ankle like a shackle. It’s accompanied by a voice from nowhere.

“Have you forgotten about me already, Tanner?”

“Porter?” My foot slips.

I look down but there’s no one, and no bottom in sight. My vision tunnels, spins. There’s a distant awareness that I’m dreaming, but I can’t open my eyes. Can’t make it stop. And I just…keep…slipping…

Tap, tap, tap.

“Tanner.”

My eyes fly open, met by a half-finished text I’d started before nodding off. For the third time.

Shit, I hope I’m not too late.

One of the newer officers, Livingston, is headed to a local prep school on a tip an administrator called in. The son of a billionaire known for his questionable moral compass was overheard bragging about his father pushing the boundaries of big-game hunting. Then it got disturbing. For some reason, witnesses got the impression an upcoming expedition may involve human prey, and they swore the pig he mentioned didn’t sound like wild boar.

Hackles were raised, along with a few red flags. Likely nothing more than a kid running his mouth, but worth a brief interview to see if further questioning is in order, knowing a mess of lawyers will follow.

It’s probably unrelated…

But if there’s one thing Isaac Porter taught me, it’s to trust my intuition, and when I heard a couple of rookies discussing it in the break room earlier, the hair on my arms stood on end. Been nagging at me all morning. Though it’s technically not my assignment, I’m tempted to exercise my senior detective liberties and ride along. Question this boy myself.

A throat clears, drawing my attention upward. The imposing figure of Chief Nelson fills the doorway, a gleam of fluorescent lighting reflecting off his bald head. Months ago, the pursed lips and furrowed brow would have been a signal that I needed to wrangle my partner before the shit hit the fan. But I’ve been a lone wolf for a while now, and lately…

Well, let’s just say, he’s started dropping subtle hints that it’s well-past time to get my head back in the game.

His fingers drum a rhythm on the frame. “Did you get that email?”

“I’ll check.” Truthfully, I can’t even remember when I last looked at my email. I snatch my phone off the desk, hoping I’m not too late to catch Livingston. “Can I get back to you in a few? Just finishing something up.”

He doesn’t budge.

Right.

With his stare burrowing into my skull, I barely glance at the phone as I finish the text—which I can only hope is intelligible—hit Send, then open my laptop. Skimming past a couple dozen untouched subject lines, I locate the email he’s referring to, sent two days ago. My neck heats several degrees.

Striding into my office, my boss skims thick fingers over a pile of neglected paperwork. It’s obvious he’s biting his tongue.

“Say what you’re thinking, Chief. I can take it.”

“All right.” An amused spark surfaces in his eyes, but there’s a deeper concern there, too. “I know there’s been a recent vacancy, but I never expected you to take up the mantle of problem child around here.”

Ouch.

Hopefully, he was at least half-joking, but there’s enough truth that I flinch inwardly. “Just had a lot going on lately. I’ll take care of it.”

“Uh-huh.” He gives me an appraising glance. “When’s the last time you slept?”

I pinch the bridge of my nose and exhale, all too aware of my disheveled hair and rumpled dress shirt with one too many buttons undone at the top. Between Dana serving me with divorce papers and my best friend disappearing, it feels like weeks. “Plenty of time for that when I’m dead. Until then, I’ve got shit to do.”

“Listen, I know you’ve been through a lot lately, and I get that you’re concerned about Porter—believe me, I do. But it’s not a crime to be missing, especially for a guy like him.” The look of pity he gives me borders on uncomfortable. “I’m?—”

“I’m sure he’s fine,” I finish, so I don’t have to hear him say it. “Just off somewhere doing what Porter does.”

Sulking, obsessing, isolating—the usual nonsense. He always comes back. I know that’s what everyone’s thinking. But they weren’t at that table in the back corner of the club on Delancy. They didn’t see Isaac’s face when I broke the news that the justice he’d spent his life serving had turned its back on him.

On Sara.

He looked at me like I’d ripped the entire world out from under him. Like I’d taken a hammer and smashed his last hope to smithereens. Like he’d been betrayed. Then he left me with a pretty stripper in my lap and disappeared.

I don’t think he’s coming back this time. What’s worse is the deep, gnawing feeling that he can’t.

What would Isaac do if it were me?

“As understanding as I may be, it’s still my job to keep this place running.” Nelson rubs a hand over his head. “I’ve been giving you a reprieve on the missed messages and late paperwork; ignored the fact that you’re chasing your own mission on company time. But I can’t look the other way for much longer.”

“Won’t happen again, I assure you.” My jaw clenches. With the even temper I used to be known for fading rapidly, I turn back to my email, tap on the mouse pad and open the attached picture. A pretty ocean view fills my screen, the water a dark contrast to the clear sky. Unconsciously braced for a gruesome crime scene, my muscles loosen. “What am I looking at here?”

Nelson reaches over me and enlarges the image. A handful of twenty-somethings stand at the end of a dock in front of a boat bearing the name Sweet Gwynevere . “See anyone familiar?”

Do I? Work mode flips on like a light switch and my vision tunnels, zeroing in on the couple front and center. Angled in a coy pose, a pretty brunette aims an exaggerated wink at the camera, her lips plastered to the cheek of the young man next to her. There’s something distant in his expression, his body stiff, like he’d rather be anywhere else.

An intangible sense of familiarity nudges me as I focus on his face.

Even in a region where the impossibly beautiful people of the world gather, he’d make a person do a double take. With a long, lean build, fair skin, and a sheath of platinum hair caught on the breeze, there’s an otherworldly air about him, like he could have stepped straight off the set of a fantasy movie…which, in this town, is entirely plausible.

Maybe that’s it. I try to place him, scouring my memory for similar actors, musicians, models…

Then my mind jumps back in time to an encounter I’ve regretted for years, and I realize I’m not looking at a celebrity.

At least, not that kind of celebrity.

Incredulous, I zoom in more. The somber face, the haunted green eyes.

Fuck.

“Tell me that isn’t?—”

Chief Nelson leans back on my desk, arms crossed in front of him, and nods. “The heir to the Crown family, in the flesh.”

My lungs empty in a dizzying rush. “I thought he committed suicide.”

“Well…” His head tilts toward the picture. “He’s about as pale as a corpse, but I’m fairly sure he’s still breathing.”

We’d been told a different story. But I suppose that’s what I get for believing the word of a cult leader, anxious to get the authorities off his back.

I study the backdrop. “Where was this taken?” Not in the mountains, where his father moved their primary network of followers after his son’s disastrously fatal birthday celebration a decade ago. “And when?”

“Just down from Redondo Beach. Four days ago.”

“Son of a bitch.”

“Seems he’s listed on the roster of the philosophy department at UCLA. Master’s program. Building his own throng of groupies out of kids searching for the meaning of life, no doubt.” He huffs an unamused laugh. “I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

His father, Alistair Crown, has a history of being a thorn in the department’s side, using his brand of charisma and trendy existential philosophies to sway the displaced hopefuls of Los Angeles into joining his family of freethinkers. But last I saw his son, he was the exact opposite. Shy, withdrawn—even his body language in the picture screams of someone out of their element.

“So, what’s the theory?” I tap the desk in a slow rhythm, guessing the Chief’s thought pattern. “That Crown’s Chosen have been lying low until the dust clears, then Junior came back from the proverbial dead to set up shop here, pulling in the younger generation?”

“Do you have a better one?”

I recall the first time I came across the kid, a ghostly twelve-year-old with wide green eyes hiding under the floorboards while we searched his father’s compound.

What was it? Twelve years ago? Fourteen?

Damn.

Social services went out for a welfare check and ended up buying Alistair’s claim that his son was on the spectrum and panicked when the cops invaded his home. But something about that story always felt…off.

Spinning my chair slowly from side to side, I contemplate the face in the picture; the man he’s grown into. I’ve thought about him over the years. Couldn’t help but wonder about the horrors he’d seen growing up in a circus like that.

Having no good answer to his question, I ask my own. “Why bring this to me? Surely, the feds still have their cult expert watching them.”

Had something happened? Granted, I managed to get closer to the elusive son than anyone in the department, but that was ages ago. It’s not like I have any influence. According to Alistair’s allegations, I traumatized him.

“Not yet, but people have a habit of dying when Ash Crown shows his face, and I don’t want him here. He’s got dubious connections, and he’s in our jurisdiction now; we have the right to keep eyes on him.”

“And I’m officially your eyes?”

“ Unofficially . For now.” He smirks. “Anyway.” He taps the desk twice and heads for the door. “I want to see you get back on track. Maybe start by seeing if you can get an ID on her.” He taps on the brunette’s face. “Fish for information. Discreetly, of course.”

“Of course.” My eyes drift to the phone as it lights up with a text.

Livingston

Leaving now.

My lungs deflate with relief as a new wave of hope straightens my spine. Standing, I look through my open doorway and into the control room. Livingston catches my eye, keys in hand, and I hold up a finger. He nods.

“If you can juggle that along with the rest of your responsibilities,” Chief says on his way out, “I’ll look the other way while you keep hunting for Porter.”

The mention of his name throws me back to the dream, the memory of his voice echoing. “Have you forgotten about me already, Tanner?”

Hell no.

Grabbing my phone, I follow the Chief to the door, reminding myself of my purpose. The system—our system—failed one of our own. Sara might not have been my blood, but she felt like it, and I’ll be damned if I lose anyone else.

Not again.

What would Isaac do if our positions were switched? He’d fucking find me, that’s what he’d do. So, while I sit in the passenger seat on the way to grill a spoiled billionaire's son on a hunch that he might lead to the whereabouts of my friend, I vow to do the same.

No matter what it takes.