PROLOGUE

The girl had been running for almost twenty minutes when she realized the car was following her.

At first, she thought it was a coincidence. A dark sedan moving slowly through the empty streets of downtown Los Angeles. But when she turned left onto Spring Street, the car turned left. When she crossed the intersection without waiting for the light, it accelerated.

She was seventeen years old, barefoot, and terrified.

Her name was Emily Parker.

And she had just witnessed something she was never supposed to see.

The rain had started an hour earlier, turning the sidewalks into dark mirrors. Emily's feet slapped against the wet pavement as she ran past closed storefronts and abandoned buildings. Her lungs burned. Her white T-shirt was soaked, and blood had dried beneath her fingernails.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small silver object.

A USB drive.

It was the only thing she had managed to take before escaping.

Behind her, a car door slammed.

“Emily!”

The voice echoed through the empty street.

She knew that voice.

That was what frightened her most.

“Emily, stop! We just want to talk!”

She kept running.

Ahead, a narrow alley separated two old brick buildings. She turned into it, nearly slipping on a pile of wet cardboard.

The alley ended at a chain-link fence.

She grabbed the metal and started climbing.

Halfway up, she heard footsteps.

“Don't make this harder than it has to be.”

Emily looked down.

A man stood beneath her, holding a black umbrella. His face was hidden in the darkness, but she recognized the expensive leather shoes and the gold watch on his wrist.

“You promised,” she whispered.

The man sighed.

“I know.”

“You said nobody would get hurt.”

For a moment, he said nothing.

Then he closed the umbrella.

“I'm sorry, Emily.”

She climbed faster.

A gunshot shattered the silence.

Emily fell.

The USB drive slipped from her hand and disappeared into a storm drain.

The man approached her body and crouched beside her. He checked her pockets, then looked toward the drain.

Somewhere in the distance, a police siren began to wail.

He stood up.

“Leave it,” another voice said from the darkness. “We don't have time.”

The man hesitated.

Then both men disappeared into the waiting car.

By morning, Emily Parker would be reported missing.

Her body would never be found.

And for the next seventeen years, nobody would know what had happened in that alley.

Until a detective received a letter.