Riker was on the heavy bag by five-thirty, before the sun had fully committed to the morning.He hadn't slept more than two hours. What sleep he'd gotten had been shallow and interrupted, his mind running the same loop — Thorne's stillness, the man in the suit's measured voice, custody matters involving unusually talented fighters — until he'd finally given up and come downstairs in the dark.He hit the bag like it owed him something.No structure. No footwork drills. Just weight behind every strike, the chain rattling against its mount, his knuckles absorbing damage he didn't fully register. Somewhere in his chest a pressure had been building since the corridor last night, and the bag was the only place he knew how to put it.He didn't hear Sable come in."Stop."Riker's fist connected once more before the word registered. He turned, breathing hard, sweat already soaking through his shirt.Sable stood a few feet back, arms crossed, reading him with the same flat attention he brought

Creed didn't speak again until they were three blocks from the school, back inside the anonymity of ordinary traffic and ordinary pedestrians."Say it," Riker said. "Whatever you're thinking.""I'm thinking about who inside the Iron Vow would have reason to talk to a faction that isn't Thorne's." Creed's voice had gone very quiet, very controlled — the specific stillness Riker now recognized as Creed's version of fury. "And I'm thinking about how few people know the details of your situation well enough to hand them to someone else. Your custody case. Iris's school. That's not information that leaks by accident.""Sable knows.""Sable recruited you into structure, not information. He wouldn't know about the school unless I told him, and I didn't." Creed's eyes moved over the street without seeming to look at anything. "The men who know about your case are the men who were in the room when I discussed your progress. Dex. Reyes. Myself."Riker said nothing, letting the silence do its ow