JJ
I arrived at the shop twenty minutes before Stitch the next morning, expecting nothing more exciting than stale coffee and an empty appointment book until noon.
The alarm accepted my code. The front door locked behind me with its usual heavy click, and the familiar scent of disinfectant and ink wrapped around me as I switched on the hallway lights. Everything looked exactly the way we had left it the night before.
That should have reassured me.
Instead, the quiet made me glance toward the back of the shop before I had even removed my jacket.
I told myself it was habit. Havoc had trained me to notice doors, shadows, and changes in a room before I noticed anything else. Lately, the helmeted man had only made that instinct worse.
I checked the front counter, then walked down the hal
