Jasper texts at 2am.
I am awake when it comes in because 2am is one of the hours when my brain processes things that the waking day doesn’t leave room for. I am sitting at my desk with my father’s journal open to entry twenty-six and the letter propped against the lamp and Damon’s family records spread across the left side of the desk — the records he brought at 7pm, the ones that confirmed from his side everything my father’s research described from mine.
The text says: my pack’s border. western grid. can I come over?
I text back: yes.
He arrives at 2:30 in a jacket he pulled on over what he was sleeping in, which means he was at his pack housing and left fast. I let him in. Mira’s house is dark except for the kitchen light I’ve left on, and we go to the front porch because the front
