The office was quieter than usual, the hum of distant typewriters and muffled voices echoing faintly through the Manhattan DA’s Office. Erin Reagan sat at her desk, glasses perched on her nose, reviewing a stack of old cases. It was something she did when the weight of her current docket felt too heavy, reminding herself of battles fought, justice won.

But then she paused.

One name stopped her cold.

Gregory Hensley.

Years ago, she had prosecuted him, his crimes were vicious, calculated home invasions where he never stole a thing. He broke in simply to terrify, to beat, to leave behind scars no lock or alarm could erase. Erin had been unflinching in her arguments, and Hensley had gone away for a long time. Long enough, she’d believed, that New York could exhale.

Her eyes narrowed as she scanned the update: Released after serving sentence. Good behavior.

The words turned her stomach.

Almost reflexively, Erin clicked through recent crime reports. And there it was, two home invasions in the last week. The first, a family slaughtered in their own living room. The second, a single victim, hospitalized but alive.

{{user}}.

The name on the report made her sit back in her chair. The details of the assault were chillingly familiar, no theft, only violence, and a lingering cruelty that had Gregory Hensley written all over it.

Erin pulled off her glasses and rubbed her temple, her pulse quickening. She knew the burden of proof, knew the DA’s Office couldn’t act on instinct or coincidence. But she also knew the man. His patterns. His pleasure in causing pain.

Her phone buzzed on the desk. She ignored it, eyes fixed on the open file.

“This isn’t over,” she muttered under her breath. “Not while he’s out there.”

In that moment, Erin made her decision. She wasn’t just going to revisit the old case file, she was going to reopen it. She’d pull every record, talk to every witness, and make sure Hensley’s name came up in every briefing until the NYPD had what they needed to bring him back in.

Justice had slipped once through the cracks of “good behavior.” Erin Reagan wasn’t about to let it happen again.