The man on the screen lifted his head.
Lucian forgot how to breathe.
Theo whispered—
"No."
The word barely carried across the archive.
But everyone heard it.
Allison looked from the screen to Lucian.
The resemblance wasn't immediately obvious.
Charles Calloway was much older than the photographs she'd seen.
Thinner.
His silver hair had receded at the temples, and age had carved deep lines around his mouth.
But his eyes—
Those were Calloway eyes.
Dark.
Observant.
The kind that made you feel as though someone had already reached a conclusion about you before you'd finished speaking.
Allison had seen those eyes across breakfast tables.
Across conference rooms.
Beside her in bed when nightmares woke her.
But Lucian's eyes had warmth beneath the calculation.
Charles's had none.
The gold Calloway signet ring gleamed on his right hand.
The same ring Theo remembered from childhood.
The same hand that had apparently made dinosaur pancakes.
