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Chapter 5: The Mark and the Map

Author: Goldentreasure
last update publish date: 2026-06-21 08:49:30

Zoe

I wake to the smell of him. His arm is draped across my waist, his chest warm against my back, his breath slow on my neck. For a moment, I forget. Then, the memory crashes back. My mother. The photograph. The black mark crawled up her arm like a vine of poison. I sit up so fast that the blood rushes to my head. Liam stirs beside me. "Zoe?" "She sent me a picture. My mother. In a room I do not recognize. A black mark on her arm. Spreading."

Liam is awake now, his eyes sharp. He pulls me against his chest. "We will find her. I have people tracing the photograph." I reach for my phone. The screen glows, and there she is – my mother, pale and small, tubes in her arms. The black mark curls from her wrist toward her elbow. Liam studies it. His thumb zooms in on the background.

A painting. Mountains, a lake, a cabin. "This is not a hospital. This is a private residence." My heart stutters. "You recognize it?" He shakes his head. "But I know someone who might." He types a message. I watch him, this man who was my enemy three days ago. Trust. Thin as glass, but growing.

"My contact will have an answer within the hour. In the meantime, we wai" "I am tired of waiting." He pulls me back down onto the bed. "Then let me distract you." His mouth finds my neck, and I forget, just for a moment, that the world is burning. His lips trace a path down my throat. I arch into him, my fingers tangling in his hair. "We should not," I whisper.

"We should not do a lot of things. But here we are." He pushes the sheet down. His eyes trace my body like a map. His hand slides down my stomach, between my legs, finding the wetness that is already there. "Liam."I know. He positions himself above me, his weight on his forearms. He pushes inside me, slow, and the world narrows to the heat of him. I wrap my legs around his hips. "Look at me," he says. I do. He moves, and I move with him. I come first, his name a cry on my lips. He follows, his face buried in my neck.

Afterwards, we lie tangled in the sheets. I trace the scar on his eyebrow. "How did you get this?" "A fight I should have walked away from." "Did you win?" He smiles. "I am here, aren't I?" Then his phone buzzes. He reaches for it, and I see the light drain from his face. "What?" He turns the screen toward me. A message. An address. And a note: Bring the girl. Come alone. Or the mark reaches her heart by midnight. My blood turns to ice. "He knows where she is."He knows where we are. This is a trap." "Obviously." "Then why are you smiling?"

I am baring my teeth. "Because we are going to walk into it anyway." The address is a warehouse on the docks. Liam drives. Marcus is in the back seat. Two more cars follow. "You should have stayed home," Liam says. "I am not a child. You can protect by hiding me in a closet." He glances at me. "You are not a soldier either. No, I am a daughter, and my mother is in that building." He takes my hand. "We get her out. We burn this place down. And then we go home." The car stops. The warehouse looms before us, a dark mouth waiting to swallow us whole. I squeeze his hand. "Let us finish this." We step out into the rain. The door is unlocked. The hallway is dark, and somewhere in the shadows, Evelyn Cole is waiting. Tick-tock, Zoe. The clock is still ticking. But now, I have a clock of my own. And it is counting down to her.

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