The ballroom of the St. Regis was a sea of crystal chandeliers, cascading white orchids, and the clinking of champagne flutes. The annual Vance Real Estate Charity Gala was usually Clara’s favorite event of the year, a night where she could leverage her family’s generational influence to raise milli

The rain was falling in thick, heavy sheets, drumming a relentless, chaotic rhythm against the roof of Detective Thorne’s unmarked sedan. They were parked in the shadowy, deserted back lot of an abandoned strip mall on the outskirts of the city, miles away from the prying eyes of Julian’s private se

The rhythmic, monotonous *thwack-thwack* of the windshield wipers did little to clear the heavy sheet of rain pelting the glass. Julian’s luxury SUV climbed higher into the Sierra Nevadas, the winding asphalt slick and treacherous beneath the tires. On one side of the road, the mountain rose in a sh