Hailey's POV
Pre-dawn wrapped the road in a dull, bruised gray as Kingsley drove.
The world felt suspended—like everything that mattered was holding its breath, waiting to see if I would finally stop running or finish disappearing. The headlights cut through mist clinging low to the asphalt, the beam catching on iron gates, stone walls, the long private road that had once felt like safety and now felt like a throat closing.
The Norway Mansion emerged slowly, exactly as it always had.
Too big, too quiet, too certain of itself.
It sat on the hill like it owned the land, the sky, the people who breathed beneath its roof. Lights burned on the ground floor despite the hour, warm and inviting in a way that made my stomach tighten. This house had always pretended to be a refuge,
