INICIAR SESIÓNChloe’s POV
Saturday morning, I finally called Alina.
I’d been putting it off, crafting the perfect “I’m totally fine” script in my head. But Friday night I’d had a panic attack so bad I’d seriously considered using Lucian’s number, and I knew I couldn’t keep pretending anymore.
The video call connected, and Alina’s face filled my screen. She looked tired but happy, baby Elena visible over her shoulder in a bounc
Chloe’s POVThe warehouse at midnight felt different from the warehouse at noon.Quieter. The city outside had settled into its nighttime sounds…distant traffic, the occasional siren, wind pushing against the high windows. The industrial lights were off and Marcus had turned on a couple of standing lamps that made the space feel smaller and warmer than I expected.Dominic was asleep on the couch. He’d lasted until about eleven, and then he’d simply lain down mid-sentence, one arm over his eyes, and that had been the end of that. Lucian had taken the spare room—Marcus had one, barely used, mattress on a frame, nothing decorative, which was very on-brand.Marcus had set up a sleeping space for me in the back corner, separated from the main room by a makeshift divider of shelving units. Private enough to feel like mine. Close enough that I didn’t feel alone.I lay in the dark and listened to Dominic breathe from ac
Marcus’s POVBy evening, the warehouse felt smaller.Not in a bad way. More like the way a space feels when it’s full of people instead of just stuff — the edges closer, the air warmer, the silence less empty. I’d lived alone for two years in this building, and I’d preferred it that way. Preferred knowing where everything was, preferred the quiet, preferred not having to account for anyone else’s presence.Now there were three other people using my kitchen and arguing about what to watch on the laptop, and I wasn’t bothered.That itself was worth thinking about.I pulled up the threat assessment around eight PM and spread it across the table. Chloe’s apartment was compromised. The hotel was obviously out. The rotation system — moving her between three locations had already failed once, and professionally speaking, it would fail again. Variable schedules only bought time. We needed something more
Lucian’s POVMorning came in through the warehouse’s high windows in long strips of pale light. By seven, I had eggs on the stove and coffee brewing and absolutely no idea where Marcus kept his spatula.“Second drawer,” Marcus said from across the room without looking up from his laptop.I found the spatula. “Thank you.”“I can feel you judging my kitchen.”“Your kitchen is extremely organized and slightly terrifying.” I cracked another egg. “I mean that as a compliment.”From the couch, Dominic’s voice: “Is there enough for everyone or just the people who weren’t up at three in the morning getting shot at?”“We were all up at three in the morning getting shot at,” I said. “There’s enough for everyone.”“Scrambled or not scrambled?” Dominic asked.“What do you want?”
Chloe’s POVThe warehouse smelled like sawdust and machine oil and, faintly, the coffee Marcus had made at some point earlier in the evening. He had a corner of it set up as a living space — a real couch, a proper kitchen area, a bathroom that was cleaner than I expected. The rest was tactical equipment and storage and the general impression that this was a place where a person lived when they were serious about not being found.I sat on the couch wrapped in a blanket someone had pushed into my hands, and I stared at the wall, and I waited for the shaking to stop.It didn’t stop.All three of them were doing things. Marcus was on his phone, quiet and clipped, reporting in to someone. Lucian was cleaning the cut on my arm with careful, precise movements, his brow furrowed slightly. Dominic had made tea, chamomile, from Marcus’s cabinet and set it on the table in front of me like he’d done it a thousand times before.&ld
Marcus’s POVThe alert came at 2:47 AM.I was already awake — I was always already awake, sitting in my truck across from the hotel with cold coffee and my laptop open, running a passive scan on the building’s entry points. Not because I expected something. Just because not watching felt wrong.The motion sensor I’d clipped to the hotel’s side entrance pinged first. Then the lobby camera feed I’d tapped through a contact at the security company showed two men walking in. Unhurried. Heads down. Dressed like they belonged.They didn’t belong.I knew it the way you know things after years of reading people in places where being wrong gets people killed. The way they moved — measured, deliberate, checking angles without looking like they were checking angles. One of them had his right hand loose at his side, just slightly away from his body. Ready.I was already out of the truck.I hit the g
Chloe’s POVShe picked up on the second ring, which meant she’d been near her phone. She was always near her phone when she was worried, and she’d been worried about me for months.“Chloe? Baby, it’s late.”“I know. Sorry. I just—” I pulled a pillow into my lap. “I needed to hear your voice.”A small pause. The kind that meant she was setting something down, giving me her full attention. “What’s wrong?”“Nothing’s wrong. I’m okay. I’m safe.” That part was true, at least. “I just have something on my mind.”“Tell me.”I leaned back against the headboard and stared at the water stain on the ceiling tiles. Funny how hotel rooms always had one.“I’ve been seeing someone,” I started.Her whole energy changed in an instant. I could feel it through the phone — the warm
Alina’s POVI didn’t leave my room for the rest of the day. Didn’t eat when someone knocked with food, didn’t respond when Maddox tried to coax me out for training, didn’t acknowledge Jaxon’s gruff “You okay in there?” through the door.Instead, I sat on my bed and thought about everything I’d over
We walked back inside together, my muscles aching in that satisfying way that said I’d actually worked. Patricia was waiting, ready to resume the torture of trial preparation, but I felt more centered now. More capable.Less like a victim and more like someone who could fight back.Two Da
Alina’s POVRonan looked at me steadily. “I think we should ask what you want. This is your life, your risk. You should have a say in how we protect you.”“Oh, now you want her opinion,” Jaxon muttered. “After she’s almost been killed twice in three days.”“Better late than never,” I shot back. “An
Alina’s POVI stared at the tracker in my palm, its tiny red light blinking like a malevolent eye, and felt the world tilt sideways.Someone on the inside had been tracking me. Someone we trusted, someone with access to my belongings, someone who’d walked beside us throu







