Chapter 1 001

IRIS POV

Snow can really kill sound and even my heart felt like it was beating softer.

I was kneeling on frozen ground, next to a grave that was partly iced over. I wasn't sure why I'd come back. Maybe it was just that guilt hits harder on winter nights.

I swiped the snow off the headstone but there was no name on it, no one had ever identified the body but it was a case file number that still bugs me.

“Victim 482.” The woman whose story I'd buried into the ground, and in the lab.

The wind shifted, bringing a smell of cold metal and pine. Then I heard footsteps, slow, steady, and heavy so it clearly was not the wind, and not my imagination.

I froze solid.

Then a voice sliced through the air, “Where did you hide the body?”

My breath caught because that wasn't a question I expected, especially not tonight. I turned and saw a man who looked like he was carved out of shadow and control.

Vale Creed.

People had seen him before on TV, in interviews, in magazines that called him ‘the man who rebuilt truth.’ The billionaire who turned forensic science into a business. His company's catchphrase used to crack me up, ‘Evidence never lies.’ and I wished that were true.

He stood by the grave in a black coat that blended with the sky. His eyes were even darker, cold, watching me like a hunter who'd been waiting.

“I asked you a question, Dr. William,” he said.

My throat was dry. “What are you doing here?”

“That’s not an answer.”

I stood, brushing snow off my knees. “This is private property, you can't just waltz onto a crime scene.”

His mouth twitched, not a smile, but close. “You sound like you still believe in rules.”

He stepped closer and the snow crunched beneath his feet. I could feel his heat, even in the cold, the kind of heat that comes from barely controlled anger.

“Mr. Creed,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady, “I think you’re mistaken. This case is done.”

“I know.” He looked down at the grave. “Done, but not cracked. Isn’t that what you do, Dr. William? You end things.”

My chest felt tight, he wasn’t wrong about that.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

He tilted his head, studying me. “A couple of months back, a woman's remains were found outside the city. The report said her DNA was a dead end, a sad one but something felt off with the paper trail, a missing file, a misplaced signature, your signature.”

I tried to speak, but nothing came out. My pulse was so loud I thought he'd hear it.

“You faked the report.” His voice was almost soft now but that was worse. “You covered for someone. Who?”

“I…” My breath caught. “You don’t get it.”

“Oh, I get it.” He moved closer. “You covered for your dad. You trashed the proof that would've nailed him for her murder.”

My vision blurred for a second because those words were a punch to the gut, a way to remember what I'd done.

He waited for me to argue, but I couldn't. The silence said enough.

“I didn't mean for…” I started, but he cut me off.

“Don’t waste my time with an apology.” His voice sharpened. “You knew what you were doing when you chose to bury the truth.”

I took a shaky breath. “My dad didn’t kill her.”

His jaw ticked. “Then why lie?”

“Because no one would’ve believed he didn’t.” My voice went up before I could stop it. “Because the real killer would've gotten away while my dad suffered for it. Because…” I trailed off.

He stared at me for a long time, and I thought I saw something in his eyes but it was gone fast.

“Do you visit all the graves?” he asked quietly. “Or just the ones you feel bad about?”

I looked away and watched as snow kept falling, hiding my footprints, erasing that I'd been here. “You don’t know everything.”

He gave a short laugh. “I know plenty.”

Then he kneeled by the grave, swiping away the snow with his bare hand until he reached the dirt. He didn’t care about the cold but looked at the ground like she lay just beneath it.

I swallowed hard. “I didn’t want this.”

“But you did it.” He stood, staring at me. “And now, you’re helping me sort it out.”

I looked up fast. “What?”

He stood up and stepped closer, every movement icy. “You’ll work for me, my company's taking another look at some cases. I need someone who knows bones, someone who knows how to hide a lie and find one.”

“That’s blackmail.”

He shrugged. “That’s a job.”

“I’m not doing it.”

He stepped even closer, his breath on my face, smelling of whiskey and winter. “You already are,” he said. “When you buried the truth.”

I wanted to yell at him, tell him I didn’t have a choice, that he didn’t know what really happened that night. But his eyes shut me down because there was no point if he didn’t want the truth.

“Why me?” I whispered.

“Because you owe me,” he said. “And because I like watching people who lied squirm when they’re telling the truth.”

He turned to leave, his coat catching the wind but before walking off, he stopped.

“Merry Christmas, Dr. William.”

I stared after him in confusion. “It’s not Christmas yet.”

“It'll soon be” He glanced back, his eyes impossible to read. “And I always collect debts before the year ends.”

He walked into the dark, the snow swallowing him until only his words were left, quiet, cold, and final.

I stood there a long time after he was gone, the wind like a punishment, my knees felt weak, and my hands numb. I looked at the grave again, buried in snow, and tried to breathe.

The life I’d built, the fake calm, the years of pretending, everything was splitting open like the ground under me. I had thought the past was buried but I was wrong.

He was going to dig it all up and this time, I couldn’t lie my way out.