The low rumble of a simulated rocket launch vibrated through the floor of the Costello-O’Malley Space Museum. A wave of delighted screams from a middle school tour group followed the sound, echoing through the main atrium. At the center of it all, Ty O’Malley grinned, his eyes sparkling with the same wonder as the kids staring up at the full-scale replica of the Orion capsule. He adjusted the microphone clipped to his polo shirt.

  “And that initial burn,” he explained, his voice full of infectious excitement, “is what gives the capsule enough velocity to break free from Earth’s gravity. It’s all about escape velocity. You have to be going fast enough that you’re falling ‘around’ the Earth instead of back ‘to’ it.”

  A young girl in the front row with bright pink glasses raised her hand, bouncing on her toes. “Like when you swing a bucket of water over your head and the water doesn’t fall out?”

  Ty’s grin widened. “Exactly like that! The bucket is the Earth’s gravity, always pulling you in. But if you have enough speed, enough forward motion, you stay in orbit. That’s physics!”

  Comet, his golden retriever, lying faithfully at his feet, lifted his head and gave a soft ‘woof’ as if in agreement. The kids giggled, and a few reached out to scratch the dog’s ears. Ty’s security chief, Buach Doherty, stood by the entrance to the exhibit, pretending to study a display on Martian soil composition. He was built like a retired linebacker, but his eyes missed nothing, sweeping the crowd with a calm, practiced vigilance.

  Even with the museum’s growing popularity, Ty felt a sense of peace here that he found nowhere else. It was a place of questions, not answers. Of discovery, not history. His family’s legacy was written in ledgers and memorialized in the faded photographs at the Golden Ailm pub, a history of stone and steel, of struggles won in brick-lined alleyways. His legacy, he hoped, was being written in the stars.

  After the Q&A, as the teacher corralled the students toward the planetarium, Ty felt a friendly shove from behind.

  “Still corrupting the youth with astrophysics, I see,” Jose Del Rios said, laughing.

  Isabela Del Rios, his big sister, looped her arm through Ty’s. “Don’t listen to him, Ty. We think it’s adorable that you’re the city’s most popular space nerd.”

  “Glad you two could make it,” Ty said, genuinely happy to see his best friends. Meeka’s half-siblings were the closest people he had to cousins his own age, and their presence always felt like a breath of fresh air. “I thought you had a constitutional law midterm.”

  “We did,” Jose said, stretching his arms over his head. “My brain is soup. I needed to see something that wasn’t a textbook. What’s new in the world of celestial bodies?”

  “Well, we just got the new imagery from the Webb telescope,” Ty began eagerly, leading them toward a darkened exhibit hall where a massive, backlit screen displayed a stunning nebula. “This is the Pillars of Creation. It’s a stellar nursery, where new stars are being born right now, thousands of light-years away.”

  Isabela stared at the swirling clouds of cosmic dust and gas, her expression awestruck. “It’s beautiful. It makes everything else seem… small.”

  Ty nodded, understanding completely. “That’s why I love it. Up there, it’s all just gravity, matter, and energy. Simple rules for a complicated universe.”

  “Wish it was that simple down here,” Jose murmured, his easy-going smile fading for a fraction of a second. The words hung in the air, a quiet acknowledgment of the world they all lived in, adjacent to Ty’s sanctuary of science. Even here, surrounded by the quiet hum of scientific progress, the shadow of the O’Malley Clann was a silent, invisible companion. Ty didn’t reply. He just watched the stars being born, a brief, unspoken understanding passing between the three of them before Isabela changed the subject, asking about Comet’s latest training session.

  ***

  The Weston estate was a world away from the museum’s open-atrium design. Here, the magnificent old trees and manicured lawns felt less like a park and more like a fortress wall. Every window was reinforced, every corner watched. It was beautiful, but it was a beauty with teeth. Meeka sat at her late Uncle Whitey’s old desk, she designed her room largely as replica of his old study.The scent of old books, leather, and faint, lingering cigar smoke was a constant reminder of the man who had shaped her.

  The door opened without a knock. Gema Banks entered, dressed in simple black trousers and a grey jacket. She held a tablet in one hand. Even in casual attire, she moved with the clipped efficiency of a soldier on a mission.

  “You wanted an update on Talibi,” Gema said, getting straight to the point.

  Meeka gestured to the leather chair opposite the large desk. “What have you found?”

  “The official story is true,” Gema began, remaining on her feet. “He was forced into early retirement two years ago. The reason cited was insubordination during the investigation into the Santoro family.”

  “The Santoros are small-time compared to us. What kind of insubordination?”

  “He pushed for federal wiretaps on a number of their political contacts. His superiors shut him down. He went ahead with the surveillance anyway, using a back-channel warrant he acquired through a state-level contact. He got caught. The evidence was thrown out, the case fell apart, and the Bureau put him on ice to avoid a scandal.”

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  Meeka leaned back, processing. It didn’t sound like the Talibi she remembered. The man who had hunted her was a master of procedure, using the rulebook itself as his most effective weapon. This was sloppy. Desperate.

  “Why would he risk his career for the Santoros?” Meeka asked.

  “That’s where it gets interesting,” Gema said, swiping a finger across the tablet’s screen. “It wasn’t about the Santoros. It was about who they were working with. Talibi was convinced they were the local partners for a much larger, international syndicate. He believed they were laundering money for them. He wasn’t trying to take down a crew of local thugs; he was trying to pull on a thread that he thought led to a global puppet master.”

  “And his bosses didn’t want him to pull that thread,” Meeka finished, the pieces starting to click into place.

  “Exactly. Someone with a lot of influence made sure the investigation was killed. Talibi didn’t take the hint. So they didn’t just kill the investigation; they killed his career. Ran him through a backroom committee, smeared him as a rogue agent, and took his badge and his pension.”

  “So he wasn’t bought. He was broken.” Meeka’s mind raced. A man like Talibi, a man driven by a crusade, wouldn’t just retire quietly. To have his life’s work and reputation destroyed by the very system he served… that would leave a mark. “What about his finances? His personal life?”

  “He’s got nothing,” Gema said flatly. “His wife left him shortly after he was transferred from Boston to Miami. Cleaned out their joint accounts. The Bureau froze his pension benefits pending their ‘internal review,’ which will never conclude. After he was forced out, he sold his house in Miami, moved back up here and is living in a small rental apartment in Revere. Our intel suggests he’s been working freelance security consulting, mostly for small businesses. Barely making ends meet. He’s underwater.”

  A disgraced agent, betrayed by his own, with no money, no family, and no purpose. It painted a very different picture. A man with nothing to lose wasn’t just dangerous. He was malleable.

  “Who was the syndicate he was chasing?” Meeka asked.

  Gema shook her head. “That’s the part that’s buried deep. We’re still digging. But whoever they are, they’re powerful enough to have friends inside the Department of Justice. Talibi made an enemy, a real one. And the Bureau chose the enemy over him.”

  “Good work, Gema,” Meeka said. “Keep digging. I want to know who that syndicate is.”

  “We will,” Gema promised. “One more thing. He knows we’re looking into him.”

  Meeka raised an eyebrow.

  “One of our digital assets flagged a counter-sweep on his public records. It was professional. He tried to hide it, but we caught the signature. He’s not a civilian playing on a laptop. He’s covering his tracks, even now. He expects us to do our due diligence.”

  Of course, he did. He had taught her that much. “Stay on him,” Meeka ordered. “I want to know every move he makes.”

  Gema nodded and turned to leave, her job done for the moment. Meeka stared at the empty chair where her uncle used to sit. He would have called Talibi damaged goods, a risk not worth taking. But Whitey had built an empire in one region. Meeka was building one across the globe. The rules were different now. The risks were bigger, and so were the rewards.

  ***

  Later that evening, Meeka found her mother, Rosie, and her Auntie Liz in the sunroom, a comfortable space filled with plants and wicker furniture. They were working on a puzzle together, a quiet ritual they’d shared for years. The comfortable silence was broken the moment Meeka entered.

  “There you are,” Auntie Liz said, not looking up from the thousand-piece landscape of an Irish coast. “I was beginning to think you were avoiding us.”

  “Just a busy day, Auntie,” Meeka said, kissing her on the cheek before doing the same to her mother.

  Rosie patted her hand, her gentle eyes full of concern. “You look tired, mo chroí. Sit. Have some tea.”

  Meeka accepted the cup but remained standing, looking out at the grounds as dusk settled over the estate. The security lights began to flicker on, casting long shadows across the perfect lawn.

  “Your uncle would have sent the gowl’s head back to the FBI in a box,” Liz said, fitting a piece of blue sky into place with a decisive click. “He wouldn’t be scheduling interviews.”

  “That’s because Uncle Pat’s answer to everything was a box,” Meeka replied, a hint of amusement in her voice. “Hammers are grand, but not every problem is a nail.”

  “This one is,” Liz insisted, her voice sharp. “He is a nail, and a rusty one looking for coin at that. Gema tells me he’s broke and disgraced. That makes him desperate, not trustworthy. A desperate man will do anything for money. Including selling us out to the highest bidder.”

  “Maybe,” Meeka conceded. “Or maybe a man who was betrayed by the law is the only kind of man who can truly appreciate ours.”

  Rosie looked from her sister-in-law to her daughter, her expression worried. “Is it worth the risk, Meeka? Ty loves his museum so much. Everything is… calm right now. Why invite a storm into our house?”

  Meeka turned from the window, her gaze softening as she looked at her mother. “Because there’s already a storm gathering in Cairo, Momma. Reese is being blocked at every turn. That’s not random. Someone is working against us, and I’d rather face them with a weapon they won’t see coming.”

  “A weapon that could just as easily blow up in your hand,” Liz countered.

  “Every weapon can,” Meeka said simply. Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out and looked at the screen. It was a text from Ashley. Simple. Direct. Final.

  Liz watched her face, her shrewd eyes missing nothing. “What is it?”

  Meeka slid the phone back into her pocket, her decision settling over her, as heavy and solid as a foundation stone. “The meeting is set.”

  Rosie’s hand went to her chest. “When?”

  “Tomorrow night. Nine o’clock.” Meeka walked over to the puzzle and picked up a piece from the box—the dark, jagged stone of a cliffside. She scanned the board for a moment before fitting it perfectly into place, connecting the sky to the sea. The image was a little more complete, a little clearer.

  “Where are you meeting this man?” Auntie Liz asked, her voice tight with disapproval.

  Meeka looked at the two matriarchs of her family, the women who represented its past and its heart. She gave them a small, reassuring smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.

  “Someplace he’ll feel at home,” she said. “I’m taking him back to the beginning. The Golden Ailm.”