The Ellijay Reckoning

When Detective Megan Carter arrives in the mountain town of Ellijay to investigate a tech-linked homicide, she collides with the impossible: a man who looks exactly like her ex-fiancé, presumed dead for three years. Now calling himself Jonathan Reed, he warns her to walk away. She refuses.

The victim was tied to Jonathan’s final undercover operation, and the task force throws them together to hunt a ruthless syndicate that has taken root inside Ellijay’s abandoned mills and orchards. As encrypted files surface, drones strike, and an informant vanishes, Megan learns Jonathan faked his death to shield her from the same assassins they’re now pursuing. Old betrayals and buried desire collide with every lead they chase.

With the syndicate preparing to move their hostage and the town turning against them, Megan and Jonathan must decide whether the truth they’ve uncovered is worth the price of their lives—and whether a second chance is possible when the past refuses to stay buried.