The Bones of the Old Case

It was her father. “What did he see?” Cal asked, low. Mara didn’t answer. She had just understood something terrible and simple: Ben had never been hiding an old accident. He had been protecting a piece of time that should never have been amplified. Footsteps sounded outside the basement door. Soft. Measured. Dress shoes on old carpet. Evan Cross stood in the doorway with his briefcase in hand and the same polite smile on his face. “You’re faster than I expected,” he said. “But this ends now.”