Ethan's POV
Ethan woke up, dread already written across his face as he rolled over to shut off the alarm.
This week had been hell.
Bloodshed. Threats. Territory slipping through his fingers like sand.
War was coming.
And Ethan didn't know how to stop it.
It reminded him of a different kind of war—the day his world first shattered. The day his parents left him behind.
He refused to feel that way again. He wasn't that helpless ten-year-old kid anymore, lost in a world that had taken the only two people he'd ever known.
Drugs.
He hated the word. Hated even thinking about it. But it was everywhere.
Creeping. Infecting. Spreading.
Same enemy, new battlefield. Only this time, he was ready.
He had to be.
They were seeping into his streets like rot in a dying tree—one block at a time,
