The cold from the hotel room floor seeped into Anais’s spine as she stared at the photo on the screen. Her body had gone still, but her heartbeat thundered in her ears.
A child.
Cassian.
No more than nine years old, eyes too big for his face, a bruise blooming under one of them.
And beside him—
Her mother.
Hair pulled back. Hand gripping a pistol. The barrel pointed at something—someone—just out of frame.
There was no timestamp. No caption. Just that one still frame from what looked like an old security feed.
But it was enough to say everything.
Anais’s voice cracked when she finally spoke. “Why does she have a gun pointed at you?”
Cassian didn’t answer right away.
He stepped closer to the screen slowly, as if the image might move, or breathe, or pull them into it. He didn’t loo
