The silence that followed the end of the phone call was heavier than the humid night air outside. Gareth Quinn stood in the corner of the Interrogation Room, the smartphone still clutched in a white-knuckled grip against his ear, even though the line had long since gone dead. His heart was hammering a frantic, uneven rhythm against his ribs, a cold sweat slicking his palms.
He had spent over a decade in the shadow of Dalton Lawson, the veteran power broker of the Midlands. He had seen Dalton navigate through massive corruption scandals, face down rival factions in the Provincial Committee, and weather the most turbulent political storms with the calm of a mountain. Never—not once in all those years—had he heard Dalton sound so genuinely rattled. The tremor in the old man's voice wasn't ju
