I gripped the edge of my desk chair so tightly, the plastic creaked and groaned. “I’m so sorry. Hell, I don’t know what I could even say to Caelyn to make this right—”

“Brody,” Griffin cut me off. “This isn’t your fault. Whoever did this is fucking with you, too. I’m calling to give you a heads-up, not because I blame you.”

The tension that had been thrumming through my body eased a fraction at his words. The community I was building here wasn’t one I wanted to lose. My friends in New York were great, and Carson would always be a brother, but everyone was so intricately woven into the art world. It was nice to have people in my life who were separate from that. It was more real somehow.

I cleared my throat. “Appreciate it, man. How’s Caelyn?”

He paused for a moment. “Freaked. Bell and Kenna are here calming her down before Parker talks to her. You might want to head over, get an update from him.”

I swallowed the bile that was crawling up my throat at the thought of being faced with yet another dead body. But I couldn’t ignore it or pretend it didn’t exist. This was happening no matter how much I wanted to will it away. “I’ll head over now.”

“Drive safe.”

“Will do.” I hit end on the screen and tossed my phone on the desk. Both hands went to the chair then. As if gripping it tightly enough would keep me from detonating. Memories flashed through my brain. The photos the NYPD detectives had shown me of the bodies they discovered. The twisted, gruesome scenes that had me losing my lunch in a garbage can in the interrogation room.

The detectives had been trying to get a read on me. Attempting to see if I could’ve been involved in the murders before my alibis had cleared me. They’d gotten their read, but the photos would live in my head forever. Taunting me. Turning to voices that asked if a dozen people would still be alive if I hadn’t started down this path to begin with.

It was a stupid question to let live in my brain, but I couldn’t seem to stop it. Josiah Mosely would’ve found something to model his murders after. He didn’t need my art. But the truth of that didn’t seem to combat the lie that had made itself at home in my mind.

And now, it was all happening again. Whether it was Sam or someone else entirely, it didn’t matter until they caught the bastard. Parker would save lives when he brought the bastard in, but I wasn’t sure I’d ever recover.