The cold, heavy weight of the steel in her palm grounded her in a way nothing else could. She stared at the weapon Silas Thorne had just offered her, her pulse pounding a frantic rhythm against her ribs. The gun was a physical manifestation of the choice laid bare bef

The sound of the gunshot seemed to echo in the study forever, ringing in her ears like a funeral bell.

For a terrifying, suspended second, time completely froze. The smell of burnt gunpowder filled the air, acrid and suffocating, masking the faint scent of her father's

The rhythmic, sterile beep of the heart monitor was the only sound tethering her to reality.

She sat in the uncomfortable plastic chair beside Silas’s hospital bed, her fingers wrapped tightly around his motionless, heavy hand. It had been fourteen hours since the me