LILY SAT on the edge of the rooftop, legs dangling over the steel railing. Lights flickered in office towers, cars moved like glinting insects, and the distant echo of sirens reminded her that danger never truly left.
She clenched her hands in her lap, staring at her fingers. They were clean, her nails polished, yet the weight of the blood she had inherited—or believed she had—sat heavily on her shoulders.
Cassian’s revelation, the files Ayden brought, Ronan’s confessions—it was a tidal wave of morality and history, and she had been trying to hold herself above it. She had been trying to decide whether she was shaped by the crimes of her father or whether she could draw her own line.
Jeremiah stepped onto the rooftop without knocking. His presence was quiet but firm, a shadow moving th
