Chapter 5

The bell above the hardware store door chimed.

Alton walked in and threw the bloody canvas bag onto the front counter. The glass display case rattled.

Delmar Boggs, the store owner, nearly fell off his stool. He stared at the blood pooling on his clean counter. "I... I don't buy illegal pelts, Combs. Take it away!"

Alton didn't speak. He pulled out a skinning knife. His hands moved in a terrifying, fluid blur. In less than two minutes, he stripped a flawless, intact pelt from the massive carcass right in front of Boggs's horrified eyes.

The sheer violence and precision of the act broke Boggs's nerve. He scrambled to his safe, counted out five thousand dollars in cash, and shoved it across the counter.

Alton took the money. He bought heavy iron nails, a high-voltage electric fence kit, and a dozen cans of baked beans. He walked out.

The moment the heavy glass door closed behind him, the midday sun hit his face.

It was blindingly bright. A truck honked its horn down the street. Two women laughed loudly on the sidewalk.

The sudden barrage of noise and light slammed into Alton's brain. The adrenaline from the cougar kill rapidly faded, leaving a gaping hole in his nervous system.

Sensory overload hit him. The street spun. His lungs forgot how to work.

He stumbled away from the main street, his vision tunneling. He crashed into the dark, damp alleyway behind the town's private medical clinic.

Alton slammed his back against the mossy brick wall. He grabbed his own head, sliding down until he hit the wet pavement. Cold sweat poured down his face. The walls of the alley seemed to close in, crushing him, dragging him back to the suffocating water cell in the Middle East.

He was losing his mind. He was going to tear his own skin off.

Then, a sound pierced through the roaring in his ears.

It was a tiny, pathetic whimper. Like a dying kitten.

Alton's bloodshot eyes snapped open. His survival instinct overrode the panic. He pulled his knife and crawled toward the sound, moving like a wounded predator among the trash cans.

Next to a biohazard dumpster, he found a cardboard box. Inside was a filthy, torn blanket.

Alton used the tip of his knife to pull the blanket back.

A baby girl lay inside. Her skin was turning blue from the cold. Her breathing was terribly shallow.

Alton froze. He leaned his scarred, blood-streaked face closer to the box.

The baby stopped crying. She opened her eyes. She reached up with a tiny, freezing hand and wrapped her fingers tightly around Alton's thick, blood-stained index finger.

The physical touch sent a violent shockwave through Alton's chest. The roaring in his head vanished instantly. His heart skipped a beat. The demons in his brain went completely silent.

He carefully scooped her up. As the blanket fell away, his eyes locked onto her tiny arm.

There were three distinct, faded needle scars near her vein. Someone had injected her.

Pure, unadulterated rage ignited in Alton's chest. He ripped off his tactical jacket and wrapped the baby tightly against his bare, scarred chest, using his body heat to warm her.

He scanned the mud near the clinic's back door. He spotted a partial footprint. It was a custom Italian leather sole. No one in this trash town wore shoes like that.

He wasn't going to call the cops. Child Protective Services would let her die in the system.

Alton carried her back to the cabin. He mashed the canned beans into a soft paste and fed it to her with his finger.

When she was full, she fell asleep against his chest. Her tiny fist still gripped his shirt.

Alton stared at the fire. The void in his soul that had been empty for eleven years was suddenly filled with a heavy, undeniable anchor.

He named her Eden.

He pulled out his satellite phone and dialed a heavily encrypted number belonging to a dark web broker he had established ties with from the inside.

"I have the offshore account routing numbers of the corrupt warden at Blackgate," Alton said coldly. "I want a clean Social Security Number and a birth certificate for a baby girl. I need it in twenty-four hours."

The broker on the other end whistled low through the static. Trading high-level blackmail material for a simple fake SSN was a massive overpayment. But he greedily agreed without hesitation.

The next morning, the encrypted fax arrived at the post office. Eden was legally his daughter-there it was, in black and white, beyond dispute.

Alton locked the paper in a metal box. He looked at Eden blowing bubbles on the bed. He made a silent vow. If anyone ever tried to take her, he would slaughter them all.