Chapter 13:

LAUREN/ZARA

The notification came in sharp, slicing through the quiet of my room.

Unknown number.

I should have ignored it. I should have flagged it for security review, like protocol demanded. But something made my finger tremble and press play.

The world tilted.

Liam.

He was strapped to a chair, wrists bound so tight the metal cut into his skin. His head hung forward, blood dripping sluggishly from a split above his brow. His breathing was ragged, shallow, as if every inhale threatened to be his last.

"No…" The word scraped out of me before I could stop it. My knees nearly buckled.

Then a voice came through the static. Deep. Familiar. Too familiar.

"Tell his father this is just the beginning. His son pay for what he did to my sister."

My body went cold, ice flooding every vein. I knew that voice. Even distorted, I'd know it anywhere.

Nick.

My brother.

I pressed a trembling hand to my mouth, biting down hard to keep from crying out.

Nick. Alive. Speaking. Sending this message like a knife meant to gut me.

He didn't know. He couldn't know. To him, I was still dead,buried in the wreckage of the girl I used to be. And he had carried that grief like firewood, feeding it until it became a blaze of vengeance.

"She's gone because of him," Nick's voice snarled, thick with rage. "And now, I'll make sure he suffers every day she never got to live."

The video cut off. Silence pressed in, crushing.

My heart slammed against my ribs so violently I thought it might crack. My brother was alive. My brother thought I was dead. And Liam… Liam was bleeding in some nameless hell because of me.

My hand curled into a fist against my chest. I wanted to scream at the walls, to hurl the phone, to collapse and sob until there was nothing left inside me. But the mask of Lauren didn't allow that. Lauren didn't have a brother. Lauren didn't have a past.

Only Zara did.

And right now, Zara was breaking.

I slid down the wall until I was on the floor, the phone slipping from my grip. My whole body shook, silent sobs ripping through me.

Nick. My brother. The boy who used to hold me and let me son in his arms after Liam broke me, the one who always swore he'd protect me. The one person who never let me feel alone in the world.

And now he thought I was gone.

Gone because of Liam.

A strangled laugh tore out of me, bitter and broken. All this time I'd been carrying my pain alone, hiding behind Lauren's skin, pretending I'd buried Zara forever. But Nick… he'd carried it too. He had turned my ghost into a weapon.

And Liam,God, Liam...he was paying the price.

Tears blurred my vision. I pressed the heels of my palms into my eyes, trying to stop, trying to breathe, but the memories came crashing back: Beatrice's smirk, Liam's cold rejection, the night everything inside me splintered.

I wanted to run to Nick. To scream, I'm alive! Stop this, please!

But what then? If he knew the truth, if he saw what I had become, would he even recognize me anymore?

A sharp inhale burned down my throat. I forced myself upright, wiping at my face, dragging trembling fingers through my hair. I caught sight of myself in the mirror. My cheeks streaked with tears, my eyes red-rimmed and raw.

That was Zara.

That was the broken girl.

But Lauren? Lauren had no tears. Lauren had no past. Lauren was unflinching, unshakable, untouchable.

I straightened my spine, rolling my shoulders back, forcing the storm inside me into silence. I picked up the phone with steady hands, though my chest still ached with every beat.

Nick could never know. Not yet.

And Liam,whether he lived or died,I couldn't afford to fall apart.

The mask was back on.

But underneath, Zara bled.

I replayed the video again, this time not with my heart, but with my eyes. Every second mattered. The grain of the walls. The faint hum in the background. The way the shadows shifted against the floor.

Pause. Rewind. Slow motion.

There.Just barely visible in the corner of a frame, a spray-painted symbol. My chest tightened. An old gang tag from the outskirts of the city. One I hadn't seen since… since I used to drag Kaylee along on my reckless adventures.

The pit in my stomach deepened.

I scrubbed through the clip again. Liam's broken groans echoed through my headphones, slicing through me like glass. He was alive, but barely. Every blow they'd laid on him, every bruise,it was Nick's anger, Nick's grief, Nick's belief that Zara was gone.

My finger hovered over the button to forward the video to Mr. Hunter. One tap, and the entire estate's guard force would mobilize. They'd tear through that hideout like a storm.

And Nick would be swallowed by it.

I lowered the phone.

If I gave this to Liam's father, Liam might live,but Nick wouldn't.

If I kept it to myself, I could go alone, reach him first, stop him before he destroyed everything. But if I failed… Liam might die.

My throat burned. My chest felt like it was caving in.

Nick had already lost me once. I couldn't let him lose himself, too.

I pressed the phone to my forehead, eyes squeezed shut. For one fleeting second, Zara screamed inside me—Go to him! Save your brother!

But Lauren's voice was colder, harder. Your job is Liam. Protect him. Nothing else matters.

I swallowed down the sob clawing its way up my throat. The weight of both lives pressed down on me, suffocating.

And still, I hesitated.

Because either choice meant losing someone.

I stayed there, frozen, the phone heavy in my hand.

Two paths stretched in front of me, both drenched in blood. One led to Liam's father, to armies of men and certain war. The other led to Nick,alone, unguarded, unprepared.

I couldn't breathe. My hands wouldn't stop trembling.

I lowered the phone onto the desk, staring at it like it was a live weapon. Because it was. The next move I made would decide everything.

And I wasn't ready to choose.

Not yet.

Then I saw Liam's face again,broken, bloodied, his body barely holding together. And behind him, Nick's shadow, fierce and blind with grief.

If Mr. Hunter sent his men, Nick would die. I knew it. And I couldn't let my brother die believing I was already gone.

My decision came sharp, cutting through the haze.

I slipped the phone into my pocket. No word to anyone. No cry for help.

If Liam was going to be saved—

If Nick was going to be saved—

It had to be by me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I slid the phone back into my pocket with a hand that didn't feel like mine. Decision made, there was no time to argue with the part of me that kept a list of contingencies. Survival wasn't improvisation ,it was preparation. Fast, cold, methodical.

First: cover. I couldn't leave as Lauren. If anyone noticed my pattern of movement, the estate would ping every camera and every gate would go up. I needed a face and a story that didn't belong to the house. I pulled the drawer where I kept off-duty gear — an old courier jacket, a battered cap, a scarf — things that blurred identity without drawing attention. I stripped the uniform from the chair and slid into the dull jacket, braid tucked under the cap. The mask stayed; not because I wanted anonymity from one person, but because it was easier to be unreadable than to explain trembling hands.

Second: tools. I emptied the small armoury drawer — pistol with a fresh clip, a compact knife, my old multi-tool. I checked the phone again for the spray tag frame, paused it, screenshot, zoomed until the tag's lettering matched a cluster of marks I'd seen decades ago on the city's industrial edge. It was ugly and thin, the kind of tag you'd only see where squatters and small-time crews fought over space. Not a gang stronghold ,not yet ,but a place Nick would pick to hide and punish. Close enough to the river, away from main roads. Perfect.

Third: deception. If I left without creating noise, they might not notice for hours. But Julian watched patterns; he'd notice if a primary operative vanished. I drafted a short, innocuous message and queued it in my secure app: "Taking extended perimeter sweep, delayed response to any calls." It wouldn't stand up to scrutiny for long, but it would buy me time, and if anyone poked immediately, they'd assume I'd gone off-grid chasing a lead. Then I locked the message in drafts. No send. I would not risk anyone else finding Nick because I'd been careless.

Fourth: route. I pulled up the city map, overlaid with camera grids I'd memorized in months on the job. I mapped a path that threaded through alleys and service roads, a route that avoided the estate's choke points and the cameras Julian loved to brag about. I chose a courier's path— small streets, back gates, restaurant loading bays that would be merciful in the hours before dawn. I timed it in my head: three hundred seconds to the north alley, twelve minutes to the embankment, thirty to reach the industrial clusters. The numbers steadied me.

Fifth: conscience. For a breath, I pictured Nick's face the way it had been in when he first moved in after mom left— stubborn, too-loud laugh, always in spaces that should have been just Kaylee and I. He thought I was dead. He was punishment made flesh. If I found him… if I failed him, I couldn't live with the weight of that. If I succeeded and he hurt Liam beyond saving, the same guilt would fracture me. Neither outcome felt acceptable, so I made the only choice that let me pretend I might still be anything but a ghost: I would go alone.

I left my room with no fanfare. The estate's night staff moved like ghosts themselves, efficient, practiced,and I slipped past them with the quiet of someone who had been trained to be invisible. The gates opened at my approach; I timed the guard rotation and stepped through the shadow that fell between two hedges. My heart pounded, but I let it be a mechanical rhythm— an engine, not feeling.

The bike I'd used for night runs was under the tarp in the staff bay: reliable, unremarkable, with a dead battery I had deliberately kept for contingencies. I thumbed the starter; it coughed and came alive, obedient. The cap hid my braid; the scarf hid the sharpness of my jaw. My pistol was cold at my hip, familiar weight that made the world sensible.

As the bike breathed into the street, the estate's lights receded behind me like a life I'd pretended to have. I threaded lanes I knew by heart, passed shuttered shops, crossed a bridge where the river smelled of oil and old rain. I did not call Julian. I did not send a message. For once, the difference between Lauren and Zara could save someone.

On the outskirts, the city started showing its ribs, broken fences, graffiti on concrete, the smell of frying oil from a 24-hour place where men watched TVs and pretended to sleep. I slowed, eyes searching: the spray tag was thin, an angular S overlaid with a crooked arrow. I'd seen it in the video for less than a second; now I hunted it like a bloodhound.

I found it half-hidden on a loading door, black paint swirled over older marks. My chest constricted, equal parts relief and the ache of dread. I killed the engine and let the silence fold around me. This was my line. Beyond it, people who could end Liam's life or save it waited. And I, the girl who'd become both the hunted and the hunter, pushed the helmet off and slid the scarf down to my neck.

I would go in alone. I would find my brother. I would see Liam. And after that,there would be no turning back.