Chapter 24 · Jonah Behind the Glass

"Nia?"

That voice hits me before the handprint on my palm starts burning.

"Jonah?"

"Don't come closer."

I'm already running.

The corridor bends into a cramped chamber: three cinderblock walls, one glass wall, and a metal bench behind it. A man sits hunched forward, gray scrubs hanging off a thinner frame.

His hair is longer. His face is older. His hands shake against his knees.

But when he lifts his head, I know those dark brown eyes.

"Jonah!"

I slam both palms against the glass. Cold bites through my skin. My breath clouds the surface between us.

He flinches. "Nia, stop. Don't touch it."

"You're alive."

"I know."

"You—" My throat closes. "Where the hell have you been?"

He gets to his feet and crosses the cell. He stops a foot from the glass, close enough for me to see the gray at his temples.

"Locked up," he says. "For eight years."

The red mark in my palm pulses. Thin lines crawl up my wrist.

"Why didn't you come home?"

"Because they'd have killed you."

"Who?"

"Celia. The bureau. Anyone who signed the pact."

I laugh once, sharp and ugly. "You let me bury you."

His jaw tightens.