Chapter 7

I read the text twice before I could make myself put the phone away.

You should have stayed gone, Ransford. Everyone you love is safer when you disappear.

No name. No number I recognized. Just enough truth in it to make my hands go cold, because some nights I still believed it myself.

The nurse cleared her throat, and I realized I had been standing in the doorway of her office for several seconds without moving.

"Mr. Claine? Do you want to sit down for this?"

"I'm fine. Just tell me."

She slid the paper across the desk instead of…