THE SILENCE AFTER THE SCREAM

CHAPTER FOUR — Marcus’s Investigation Deepens

If Marcus had one fatal flaw, it was the way he treated danger as if it were an abstract hobby — something you could pick up, examine from all angles, and then set neatly back on the shelf. He never believed it could reach out and touch him. Not really. Not him, with his quick wit and quicker charm. He thought his instincts were enough to protect him. He thought he could outrun consequences.

That week, I began to realise he’d underestimated the thing he was chasing.

He and I met for coffee the next afternoon, more out of habit than anything else. He chose a table by the window, though he barely noticed the view. His phone sat between us, face-down, as if keeping it upright would somehow invite trouble. His eyes were restless, flicking toward the door every time it opened.

“You’re jumpy,” I said, stirring my drink. “Your source giving you grief?”

“Not grief,” he murmured. “Pressure.”

The way he said the word made something cold settle in my stomach.

He leaned forward, lowering his voice even though the café was nearly empty. “There’s more to this than I realised. Nothing solid yet, but… connections. Patterns. People who shouldn’t know each other do. Money moving where it shouldn’t. And—” He pressed a thumb to his temple. “It’s starting to feel like someone’s watching me.”

I almost laughed — not to mock him, but because Marcus never admitted fear. Not once in all the years I’d known him. Even when he was deep in stories about illegal shipments, corrupt MPs, private security firms with too much power… he’d always treated it like a game. A dangerous game, yes, but one he believed he could win simply by being clever.

Now, for the first time, he didn’t sound clever.

He sounded hunted.

I asked if he’d told Sophia. He hesitated.

“She’s too distracted,” he said, exhaling. “And honestly, I don’t want to add to whatever she’s dealing with.” His mouth tightened. “It’s like she’s sliding somewhere I can’t follow. She’s distant. Forgetful.”

“That happens,” I said gently. “Deadlines. Stress.”

“No,” he said, and the weight of that one word landed between us. “This is different.”

He paused, rubbing his hands together as though trying to warm them. “She told me last night that she lost time. An hour, maybe more. Just… gone. She said she woke up on the floor of her study with the window open and her notes everywhere. She doesn’t remember writing them.” A strained breath escaped him. “She said she felt like someone had been in the room with her.”

A prickle of unease swept across my skin.

“Did you see the notes?” I asked.

He shook his head. “She’d torn them up already. Said she didn’t want them ‘watching’ her.”

I didn’t know what to say. Marcus looked tired — not just from lack of sleep, but from carrying two separate fears: one for himself and another for her. He was stretched thin, and Sophia, in her own way, was fraying too. They were two storms building in opposite corners of the same sky.

We sat quietly for a moment. Outside, the wind was picking up again, tugging leaves down the pavement like scraps of burnt paper.

“Marcus…” I began, but he interrupted.

“Don’t,” he said. “I know what you’re going to say.”

“No,” I replied softly. “Actually, you don’t.”

His gaze lifted to mine, weary and pleading, as if hoping I could give him an answer he hadn’t yet realised he was searching for. But I couldn’t. I didn’t understand what was happening to them any more than he did.

He checked his phone again, saw something that made his face blanch, then slipped it into his pocket.

“I need to get back,” he muttered. “The source wants to meet again. Says he has something I need to see.”

“Maybe wait until morning,” I said. “Or at least until the storm calms.”

He gave a thin smile. “Since when have I ever waited for weather?”

I didn’t push him. I should have. Not because I could have stopped him — Marcus Hale was unstoppable when he thought he was close to a breakthrough — but because it might have made him hesitate. Even a heartbeat of hesitation can change the shape of a night.

Before he left, he reached across the table and squeezed my shoulder.

“Keep an eye on her, will you? If she calls… just, don’t ignore it.”

“I won’t.”

He nodded, stood, and buttoned his coat. I watched him walk out into the wind, hair whipped sideways instantly, coat snapping around him. He looked small against the gathering storm.

I wish I could say some part of me sensed what was coming — that I felt the shape of tragedy forming around him — but the truth is simpler and sadder.

I thought we’d all be fine.

I thought storms passed.

I didn’t realise some storms were waiting for us to walk straight into them.