The sound was coming from the old carriage house behind the main stables, a place the estate staff referred to simply as The Vault.

Cora pushed past a row of overgrown boxwood hedges, her thin-soled sneakers sinking into the wet morning grass. The air here smelled different—less like manicured rose gardens and more like old cedar, rust, and copper.

When she reached the heavy oak door of the carriage house, she didn't knock. Through a reinforced glass panel near the top, she peered inside.

The space was dark, lit only by a single high window casting a pale gray shaft of light across a concrete floor. In the center of the room sat a massive steel cage, reinforced with iron bars thick enough to hold a grizzly bear. Inside that cage was Nero.

Even from a distance, the sheer scale of the dog took her breath away. He was a Cane Corso, but bred with something larger—an ancient, heavy-boned lineage of war dogs. His coat was the color of wet slate, his chest broad enough to break a grown man's ribs, and his paws looked like dinner plates. But it wasn't his size that made Cora's heart clench.

It was his posture.

Nero wasn't pacing. He was pressed flat against the far corner of the cage, his massive head buried between his front paws. Every few seconds, a low, shuddering whimper escaped his throat, followed by that hollow, broken bark that had drawn her across the estate.

"Hey, big guy," Cora whispered, pressing her face against the cold glass.

The dog didn't lift his head. He just gave a violent shudder, his ears pinning flat.

"You're okay," she murmured, her voice soft and rhythmic, the same tone she had used with her mother during the worst of the nights when the pain medication failed to work. "I know it's loud. I know it's dark. But you're not invisible anymore."

A heavy hand suddenly clamped down on Cora's shoulder, spinning her around so fast her sneakers skidded on the gravel.

Standing over her was a man built like a brick wall, wearing an impeccably tailored charcoal suit that looked entirely out of place in the mud. His hair was cropped military-short, graying at the temples, and his eyes were the color of a winter sky—cold, assessing, and completely devoid of warmth.

"You shouldn't be back here," the man said. His voice was a low, gravelly baritone that vibrated right through Cora's chest.

"He's terrified," Cora said, not pulling away from his grip. "And whoever put him in a metal bowl environment with echoes like this should be locked in a cage themselves."

The man's eyes narrowed. "Do you know who owns that animal, girl?"

"I don't care if the President owns him," Cora snapped, a sudden flare of long-repressed anger overriding her fear. "He's in pain. Look at his left ear—there's scar tissue all the way down the canal. He's got an infection, and the sound in this concrete box is making him feel like he's drowning."

Silence stretched between them, thick and dangerous. The guards from the gate were jogging up the path now, breathless and apologetic.

"Mr. Thorne," one of them puffed, stopping short. "We're sorry. She wandered off—"

The man—Dante Thorne, the name echoing in Cora's mind like a death sentence—held up a single hand. The guards froze.

Dante looked back at Cora, then slowly turned his gaze toward the glass window of the carriage house. Inside, Nero had stopped whimpering. The massive dog had dragged himself across the concrete and was now pressing his huge, scarred snout directly against the glass where Cora's face had been moments before.