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When 23-year-old Luna disappears without a trace, the world believes she’s dead. But her spirit lingers, tethered between life and death—and only one man can see her.

John Carter has been cursed with the ability to see ghosts ever since the tragic death of his twin sister at age ten. Haunted by her spirit and the ridicule of a world that called him crazy, John turned his curse into a mission: help the lost find justice.

But nothing prepared him for Luna.

As Luna’s memories return in disturbing flashes, John pieces together a string of horrific murders linked by surgical precision and eerie identity swaps. All the clues point to one man: Dr. Elias Voss, a disgraced surgeon turned psychopath known only to the media as The Sculptor. His twisted obsession with “fixing” lives has left a trail of mangled corpses and swapped identities—all hidden beneath the surface of society.

Luna is not dead. Not yet. Her body is alive—trapped in a medically-induced coma, hidden somewhere in the depths of Voss’s secret lair. And time is running out.

Together, John and Luna must outwit a brilliant, deranged killer who has turned human lives into his art. But the deeper they go, the more blurred the lines between life, death, and madness become.

Can they bring Voss to justice before Luna’s tether to life snaps forever?

Or will they become his final masterpiece?

A Psycho's path

**Chapter Seventeen: The Garden Visitor**

The firefly guts on Lilian's palms smelled like copper.

Luna knelt, her knees pressing into the spilled water and shattered glass. She grabbed her daughter's wrists—too tight, she'd regret that later—and turned the small hands upward. Not glitter. Not bug remains.

John crouched beside them, his cop-face sliding into place. "Lu? What's wrong?"

Lilian blinked, her pupils shrinking back to normal. "Daddy, I'm sticky."

The reflection in the microwave was just a reflection now.

Luna forced her fingers to unclench. "You—you touched something in the garden."

"I know," Lilian said, matter-of-fact. "The man gave it to me."

John's body went rigid. "What man?"

Lilian pointed out the back door. "The one with the shiny shoes."

**The garden at dusk** became a crime scene.

John's flashlight cut through the gathering dark, illuminating trampled grass where fireflies still pulsed like dying stars. Luna clutched Lilian against her chest, the child's heartbeat fluttering against her own.

*Too fast. Too slow. Too human.*

"Nothing here," John muttered, kicking at the overgrown hydrangeas. But his service revolver was unsnapped. He'd seen Luna's face.

Luna held tighter. "Not yet, baby."

"*Enough.*" John's voice cracked like a whip. Lilian went still. He never raised his voice. Never.

The flashlight beam caught something metallic in the grass.

John bent, gloved fingers pinching a surgical scalpel between two leaves. Fresh blood gleamed along the edge.

**The police report** would say it was a prank.

*Teenagers. Copycats. Nothing to worry about.*

John's colleagues patted him on the back, made jokes about paranoid parents. Only Detective Ruiz lingered after the others left, her sharp eyes noting how Luna hadn't set Lilian down once.

"You seen this before?" Ruiz asked quietly, holding up an evidence bag containing the scalpel.

John shook his head. "Just some sicko trying to scare us."

Ruiz hesitated. "There was a call today… Jane Doe found near the old train yard. Missing her left hand. *Clean cut.*"

The unspoken *like your wife's victims* hung in the air.

Lilian, half-asleep in Luna's arms, murmured: *"He only takes the pretty parts."*

Ruiz's coffee cup hit the floor.

Luna stood over Lilian's crib, watching the rise and fall of her daughter's chest. Normal. Human. *Hers.*

A voice that wasn't static: *"She's mine by design, Luna."*

Luna's head snapped toward the closet.

Inside, a single pair of polished Oxfords gleamed in the moonlight.

The garden visitor