DARKHOWLER - ONE HOUR BEFORE EXECUTION
Agnes barely made it to the basin.
The bile came without warning, acidic and vicious, her body folding over the marble rim. Her knuckles went white against the stone. Her throat burned. Her eyes watered, and the tears were chemical, involuntary, carrying none of the emotion she was saving for later.
She waited until the spasms stopped. Counted to ten. Splashed water on her face with hands that were steady because Agnes Viremont's hands were always steady, even when the rest of her was falling apart from the inside.
The timing of the message had been surgical. Twenty minutes. Enough to arrive, too little to plan. How her father knew Garrett was gone, how he knew she was alone, how the information reached her at all, she refused to examine. Reginald Viremont had intelligence networks the way other men had hobbies, and the methods were always deniable and the results were always precise.
