The message came just after eleven.
**Noah: Can we talk? At the house? I'm here now.**
Landon stared at the screen for a long second before replying.
**Landon: Be there in twenty.**
He didn't bother changing. Just grabbed his keys, left his apartment, and drove.
The city was asleep, but the roads weren't silent. They hummed with that kind of lonely noise that came only after midnight. Streetlights flashed over his windshield like ghosts. Every red light felt longer than the last. Every breath tighter. He rolled the window down, letting cold air sting his face, hoping it would quiet the noise inside him.
It didn't.
By the time he pulled into the driveway, the house looked the same as it always had. Big. Cold. Full of shadows that remembered everything. He hesitated be
