The world outside the car window bled into a muted blur of green and grey as the engine roared, carrying us further away from the Stone compound.

My head throbbed with a dull, sickening rhythm. Warm, sticky blood dripped down my temple, tracking a red line past my jaw and pooling at the collar of my torn dress. But the physical pain was nothing compared to the hollow, terrifying void expanding inside my chest.

Rosa was dead.

The image of her collapsing onto the dirt, the crimson stain spreading across her three-piece suit, was seared into the back of my eyelids. She had hesitated because she cared—because she still saw...