The line goes dead.
I sit on the hallway floor and think about my father writing "clarity" in blue ballpoint while the man who taught him that clarity sat in the next cell planning how to find his daughter.
* * *
Rookie is at Backroads by ten.
The club is watching me so I should feel safe.
I don't. Because safety is a feeling I've never been able to hold for more than a few hours, and the last man who promised me safety was my father.
My shift ends at midnight. I grab my jacket, pull my keys, and Rookie is waiting by my car.
He reaches for my hand.
The voice comes from behind me.
Not shouted. Calm, steady, coming from the shadow between the dumpster and the building's east wall where the lot light doesn't reach.
Creedy steps out, his boot scuffing gravel. "Saylor."
Same cap, same broad frame. Same practiced smile that doesn't reach anywhere near his eyes.
"I told you he wouldn't stop." He says it like he's delivering good news. "Your daddy's a persistent man."
Rookie moves. Two strides. His body slots between mine and Creedy's, his shoulders squaring, his chin dropping.
"You need to leave." Rookie's voice drops low enough to vibrate in my sternum. Flat. Final.
Creedy lifts his palms, spreading his fingers wide. "Easy, kid. I'm not here for trouble."
Rookie takes another step forward. "I'm not a kid, and you’ve got ten seconds to get the fuck back in your truck and leave."
Creedy's smile cracks. What's underneath isn't friendly.
He's sizing Rookie up the way my father used to size up anyone who stood between him and what he wanted.
His attention shifts past Rookie, finding me.
The practiced smile is gone now, replaced by something thinner and harder.
A look I recognize from my father's sentencing hearing.
He tilts his head to see around Rookie's shoulder. "Saylor, honey, your father loves?—"
"She told you to stay away." Rookie's voice cuts across Creedy's without raising a single decibel. "Her mother told you. Now I'm telling you."
Creedy's jaw tightens. He takes half a step to the right, angling to see around Rookie, and Rookie mirrors the movement without hesitation. Blocking. Keeping his body between mine and Creedy's sightline.
The calmness drains away, and what replaces it is interest.
The attention of a predator who's been challenged.
He looks at Rookie's cut. At the prospect patch.
"You're a prospect." He says it like a diagnosis. "You're nobody."
Rookie doesn't move. Doesn't blink. His breathing hasn't changed since the confrontation started, and the stillness of his body is more threatening than any fist I've ever seen raised.