Chapter 1

Norah Holt stepped out of her small, one-room apartment just outside Haywood Lake’s city limits. The screen door slammed shut behind her. Calling it an apartment was generous. A converted garage sat behind an aging single-story house with peeling paint, patchy grass, and rust stains running down the gutters. But the rent was cheap, the utilities worked, and the landlord preferred cash and minding his own business. Right now, that felt close enough to perfect.

She headed toward the faded blue beater car she’d bought from a mechanic over on Route 17 who smelled like motor oil and cigars and never once asked her last name. The car rattled when it idled; the driver’s side window was temperamental at best, and one of the hubcaps was missing, but it ran. It wasn’t much, but neither was the life she’d built since arriving in Florida.

The cool morning air felt good against her skin. Utilities didn’t include air conditioning in her apartment, and come summer, the place would feel like a slow cooker.

For a few seconds, the morning reminded her of early days in Laurel Creek, tucked in the foothills outside Blackridge, Tennessee. Mornings there smelled like wet earth, pine and woodsmoke drifting through the hills. Here the air carried the faint, sweet scent of jasmine from somewhere nearby and, underneath it, garbage that hadn’t been picked up.

She missed the mountains. Missed the tiny school tucked outside Blackridge. Missed the kids who complained about homework but still showed up to help stack chairs after games. She even missed the people who waved from porches, knew each other’s trucks by sound alone, and knew everybody’s family history going back generations.

Here, nobody noticed anyone unless the cops showed up.

By mid-morning, though, it would be hot and humid. She still wasn’t used to that.

Some kind of bird in the tree chattering to its neighbor. In the distance, tires hummed along the highway, blending with the faint bark of a dog somewhere down the street.

Today she had a catering job at Plated Perfection. Mia Whitmore, the owner, had taken a chance on her without asking too many questions and paid under the table. Then tonight she’d work her shift at the Rusty Anchor Tavern. The place was a dive filled with fishermen, construction workers, and locals looking to drink away bad decisions, but the owner, Owen Fletcher, was kind and had no problem paying her in cash.

Technically, she was surviving. So, it was all good.

Yeah. Totally good.

If you ignored the cash-only jobs, the fake explanations, and the way her stomach tightened every time an unfamiliar car slowed near her apartment. She still checked her rearview mirror constantly. Still noticed entrances and exits. Still watched for men who lingered too long in parking lots or who looked strangely at her a second too long.

And underneath it all was the thought she could never quite outrun.

Jeremy.

Her younger brother had always been the fearless one. The one who believed he could fix problems if he just worked hard enough. The one who showed up whenever she had a problem.

Then he’d died.

According to the police, Jeremy had been involved with a criminal operation. The news claimed he’d made his own choices and paid the price.

Most people accepted that explanation. Norah never had.

Because a week before his death, Jeremy had called. His voice sounded scared and exhausted.

If anything happens to me, don’t believe what they tell you.

The memory still made her chest tighten.

She’d tried asking questions, tried finding answers. Convinced herself that there had to be some mistake.

The threats had started soon after. Anonymous calls. A break-in that left nothing missing. A truck that sat across the street for two days before disappearing.

Coincidences? Maybe. But she didn’t believe in coincidences.

All she knew was that six months ago, she’d packed her clothes, a few family photographs, Jeremy’s old baseball glove and everything else that fit in the beat-up blue car and driven south.

And she hadn’t stopped looking over her shoulder since.