"Can you just stop. She's already torn up over this?" Andy's voice cut through the air, sharp with anger. "And I have told you many times, don't talk to her like that. She's your granddaughter whether you like it or not."
Sheriff Dawson let out a bitter scoff. "Oh, please. You think playing protective father now makes you some kind of hero? All it proves is how far she's dragged you down. I'm disappointed in you, son."
"I said shut your mouth," Andy snapped, his jaw flexing.
Naturally, Sheriff Dawson ignored him. He shifted his attention back to me, and the look on his face held nothing even remotely grandfatherly.
"You show up, and suddenly this town turns into a war zone. Dead bodies. Break-ins. Police crawling everywhere." He jabbed a finger into Andy's chest. "And my son is too blinded by guilt to see what you're doing to him."
Each of his words hit like daggers to my heart. I never wanted any of this or to drag Andy into the mess that I uncovered in this house. I'd only wanted answers about my house and life. Beside me, Zeke must have felt my stress. He closed his hand around mine, steady and warm, grounding me. I clung to it because if I didn't, I wasn't sure what would happen.
"Sheriff Dawson, this is a federal matter. I need you to step back," Agent Williams said in a tone that invited no argument.
"You don't get to tell me how to handle my family," the sheriff shot back without even looking at him.
"Dad, please. Not now. You're only making this worse," Andy said, dragging a hand over his face.
Sheriff Dawson rounded on him. "You had a good life. A stable life. Then she shows up"—he jerked his chin toward me—"and everything goes to hell. Have you even stopped to think about how your wife feels about a long-lost daughter suddenly appearing?"
Uncle Donovan stepped forward, his voice low and furious. "With all due respect, you're talking about your granddaughter."
The sheriff's eyes snapped to him. "She's a Catalano. They're no good, the whole lot of them. That's all I need to know." The words struck like an open-handed slap.
Uncle Donovan's expression hardened. "So were my parents. So am I." The sheriff didn't flinch. Didn't apologize. Before the tension could splinter into something worse, Sharon moved to Andy's side and laid a gentle hand on his arm.
"Andy, honey," she said softly, all warmth and concern. "Maybe we should go inside." Her voice was perfect. Her expression was sympathetic. But there was something wrong in her eyes—something watchful and cold that made my skin tighten. An hour ago, I might have missed it. Now I couldn't stop seeing it.
"Yes. Inside—all of you," Agent Williams said, gesturing toward the house. Then he looked directly at the sheriff. "Except you. You can go."
"The hell I can," Sheriff Dawson barked. "They're staying right here."
Andy turned to him. "Go home, Father." His voice was flat and final.
"Excuse me?" the sheriff demanded, blinking as if the words had physically struck him.
"You heard me," Andy said. "You're not helping." For a split second, Sheriff Dawson looked ready to explode. Then his gaze slid to Sharon. A tiny nod passed between them—so small I might have written it off before. But after Ted. After the recordings. After the look in Sharon's eyes on the porch. I didn't write anything off anymore.
The moment we stepped inside, the air changed. The house felt smaller somehow, tighter, as if the walls had started listening, too, but it also felt charged, like after a thunderstorm. Agent Williams shut the door behind us and turned immediately to Zeke and Uncle Donovan.
"Zeke. Donovan. The device?" he asked.
Donovan tapped the floorboards with the toe of his boot. "Safe and sound in the hidey-hole." Sharon's gaze flicked toward the office for half a second—brief, but not brief enough. It slid there and back so fast it might have looked accidental to anyone else. It didn't to me. Andy missed it. He was too busy pacing.
"Roxanne, what's going on?" Andy asked, running a hand through his hair. "Why was Ted dumped here?"
"He was barely alive when he got here," Zeke said. "That's all we know."
Andy went pale. "Dumped by who? Did he say anything?"
"Not enough," Agent Williams said smoothly. "But we'll figure it out." He let the pause breathe, then added, "We'll go through the files again later. There may be something we missed."
Sharon's expression never changed, but her shoulders tightened almost imperceptibly. Zeke saw it. Donovan saw it. I saw it. Andy still didn't. He was standing in the middle of a room full of danger, and the worst of it was wearing his wife's face.
"Roxanne, do you want me to stay here tonight?" Andy asked. "I'd feel better if I was close by after everything that happened."
I hesitated, then nodded. "Yeah. I would too."
Zeke squeezed my hand. "It would help. I've got work early tomorrow, and I'd rather know there's someone else here with her and Donovan."
"Then it's settled," Andy said. "I'll stay. I've got vacation time. I can use it." Sharon stepped forward at once, smiling gently.
"Andy, honey, I can stay too." Her tone was soft, caring, perfectly measured—but her eyes went once more to the office door.
Agent Williams stepped in before Andy could answer. "Mrs. Dawson, you should go home and get some rest. We'll need you fresh tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?" Sharon asked, blinking.
"Yes," Agent Williams said. "I'll need you at the station in the morning. Routine follow-up."
"All right," she said after the slightest pause.
"You should go home, sweetheart," Andy told her. "I'll stay with Roxanne tonight."
"Of course," Sharon said, her smile tightening at the edges. She kissed Andy's cheek, hugged him, then turned to me. "Feel better soon, Roxanne. I'm here day or night if you need me." The words were gentle. Her eyes were not. They lingered on me a beat too long, and something cold moved through me, slow and certain. Then she left.
The instant the door clicked shut behind her, the room seemed to exhale. Zeke locked the front door. Donovan pulled the blinds. Agent Williams turned to Andy. No one spoke above a murmur, as if saying too much too loudly might bring her right back through the door.
"Sit down," he said. "We need to talk."
"About Sharon," Zeke said quietly.
Andy frowned. "What about her?"
Agent Williams gave Donovan a nod. He slipped into the office and returned a minute later with the hidden flash drive.
"What's going on?" Andy asked again, unease sharpening his voice.
Instead of answering right away, Agent Williams plugged the drive into his laptop and reopened the folder marked A.D. PRIORITY. He looked at Andy for a long moment before speaking.
"Your wife," Agent Williams said quietly, "has been reporting to Dunhill."
All the color drained from Andy's face. "No," he whispered. "No. She wouldn't. She—"
"Andy, we have proof," Uncle Donovan said.
"And Ted died trying to warn us," Zeke added.
Andy's breathing turned shallow. "What do you mean?"
Agent Williams clicked the first audio file. Sharon's voice slipped into the room, soft and familiar and wrong. Andy's knees gave way, and he dropped into the nearest chair as if the sound itself had struck him. I moved to him and laid a hand on his shoulder, but even that felt small against the size of what was breaking open in front of us.
"We're going to figure this out," I said softly. "Together."
He scrubbed both hands over his face. "What do we do?"
Agent Williams looked at all of us. "We trap her. We let her believe we don't know anything, and then we use her to get to Dunhill."
Andy sat hunched forward, staring at the floor as if it might split open and swallow him. His hands trembled with the force of what he'd just heard. Zeke stayed quiet on the couch, solid and watchful. Uncle Donovan leaned against the wall, arms folded tight, listening for sounds that weren't there. Agent Williams stood beside the table, the laptop screen dimming between us. The veil had started to stir again—nothing violent yet, but enough to charge the air. Enough to make every little sound in the house feel loaded.
Finally, Andy lifted his head. "Okay," he said, voice rough. "I'm in. She played me for a fool, and she thinks she can hurt my daughter? Not happening. Tell me what to do next."
Agent Williams answered first. "You report anything unusual she does. No one lets on that we know. If we play this right, she may lead us straight to Dunhill's endgame."
"I'll try," Andy said. "But I don't know if I can even look at her right now." The pain in his voice made my chest ache. It was the sound of something intimate and trusted being stripped bare.
Uncle Donovan pushed off the wall. "We need to be careful. If she suspects we know, she'll run straight to Dunhill." Andy flinched at the name.
"And if Dunhill thinks she failed," Agent Williams added, "he won't take her back in. He'll cut his losses. We need to know how she got involved and what part she's supposed to play in all this."
"She's my wife," Andy said, his voice cracking on the last word.
"She's also the enemy," Zeke said bluntly. Andy looked away.
I leaned forward. "Dad, we're not asking you to confront her. Not yet. For now, just be the husband she expects you to be. Act normal. Let her think everything is fine. Can you do that—for me?"
He nodded slowly. "I can try." His voice trembled enough to make it clear how much that would cost him. A few minutes later, his phone buzzed on the table. The sound cut through the room so sharply all of us looked at it at once. Andy glanced at the screen, and the air seemed to go thinner.
Sharon:Are you still with Roxanne? Is she okay? Do you need me to come back? I can leave right now.
Zeke leaned over his shoulder. "She's testing you."
Agent Williams nodded. "She wants to know whether you're upset—whether you suspect anything."
"What do I say?" Andy asked, staring at the message.
"Something neutral," Agent Williams said. "Something she can't read too much into." Andy took a breath and typed slowly.
Andy:Yes, I'm still with her. No, don't come back. It's going to be dark soon, and I'd worry about you on the road. Everything's fine, but I'm staying here tonight. Everyone's still shaken up. I'll see you in the morning.
He hit send. No one spoke. We all watched the screen in silence while the typing bubble appeared, vanished, then appeared again. Even that tiny pulse of movement felt sinister now.
Sharon:Okay, love you.
For one terrible second, Andy's face came apart. Then he forced it back under control. Barely. The effort of it looked painful.
"She's lying," he whispered. "She's been lying to me for years."
I reached for his hand and squeezed. "We'll get through this together, Dad." He nodded, but his eyes had gone glassy.
A sudden knock at the door made all of us jump. Zeke moved first, hand on the knob. Agent Williams stepped in beside him, calm but ready, one hand resting near his holster. Donovan shifted toward the hallway, blocking the office door without being told. I stayed where I was, but the veil surged coldly through me, a warning that settled deep in my bones.
"Of course it's you," Zeke muttered as he opened the door a crack. Sheriff Dawson stood on the porch again, hat in hand, irritation etched into every line of his face.
"Andy," he barked, pushing past Zeke without waiting to be invited in. "Are you okay, son? What the hell is going on here?"
"Dad, not now," Andy said, going rigid.
The sheriff ignored him. "Sharon called me. Said you were acting strange. Said she thought something was wrong at this house." At the mention of her name, the room went dead still. It felt less like a sentence and more like a threat, finally spoken out loud.
"Of course she did," Zeke said under his breath.
The sheriff turned back to Andy. "You want to tell me why your wife is worried sick while you're holed up over here?"
"Damn it, Dad, I'm fine," Andy said, agitation cracking through his voice.
"You don't look fine," Sheriff Dawson snapped. "You look like you're hiding something."
"I'm not," Andy said, though he swallowed hard after it.
Sheriff Dawson stepped closer and lowered his voice. "You think I don't know when you're lying? I raised you, boy. I know every tell you've got." Andy flinched. "Now you're staying here? Overnight? With them?" He gestured around the room, carefully not looking at me. Somehow, that hurt more than if he had.
Zeke stepped forward, voice calm but firm. "He's staying because he wants to be close to his daughter."
"I wasn't talking to you," Sheriff Dawson said, shooting him a glare.
"Sheriff," Agent Williams cut in, stepping forward. "This is private—"
"I don't care what it is," Dawson snapped. "My daughter-in-law is frightened, my son is acting strange, and I'm not leaving until I know why."
The veil pressed harder—cold, sharp, reactive. A picture frame on the wall started to rattle. The sound was small, but in the silence, it seemed unnaturally loud, as if the house itself had flinched.
Sheriff Dawson's eyes flicked to it. "What the hell—"
Andy cut him off, irritation suddenly cutting through the shock. "Since when are you and my wife close enough for her to call you? As far as I know, she barely talks to you."
For the first time, the sheriff looked wrong-footed. "We're not close. I gave her my number earlier. Just in case you all ran into trouble again." He said it too fast, fidgeting as he spoke, and no one in the room believed him. Not with Ted dead. Not with Sharon's voice still echoing in my head.
"Dad, just go home," Andy said, stepping toward him, his voice shaking now for a different reason. The sheriff hesitated. His eyes moved from Andy to the rattling frame, then across the rest of us.
Finally, he exhaled sharply. "Fine. But this isn't over." He turned and stormed out, slamming the door behind him. The moment it shut, the picture frame went still.
"Well," Uncle Donovan said dryly, "that was a delight."
"More like a disaster," Zeke muttered.
"We need to move faster," Agent Williams said, rubbing a hand over his face. Andy sank back onto the couch and buried his face in his hands. The room went quiet again, but it wasn't peace. It was the kind of silence that settles in after something has already gone wrong and everyone knows worse is coming.
"What do we do now?" Andy asked hoarsely, lifting his head.
I looked at each of them in turn—my father, shattered but trying; Zeke, steady at my side; Uncle Donovan, braced for a fight; Agent Williams already thinking three moves ahead. Ted was dead. Sharon had been in my house, smiling at me while she watched and waited. The veil hummed beneath my skin like a live wire. I drew a breath and said the only thing that made sense.
"We stick to the original plan," I said. "We act normal. We watch Sharon. We tighten security here, and when the time comes, we let her make her move." Even as I said it, dread moved through me, slow and cold. Because plans only worked when the enemy played by rules. And nothing about this felt safe enough for rules anymore.