CHAPTER 20: WARNING SHOT
Pale blue light glowed from the phone in Kael’s palm, cutting sharp through the deep shadow draped over the back porch. One short line burned bright and unmissable against the dark screen: The capital isn’t safe. He sends shooters — same way they came for your father.
Kael stared without moving for three long, silent heartbeats. His knuckles whitened where he gripped the casing hard enough to make the plastic creak. His jaw locked tight, the muscle jumping beneath skin stretched thin with old, unhealed grief he’d carried for ten years.
“Shooters,” he breathed low and rough, like the words scraped raw on the way out. “Right at the rally. Same old trick… kill us, call it a gang war, bury the truth forever, and walk away looking like the hero who cleaned up the str
