Chapter Seventeen

The Ghost in His Eyes

The city didn’t sleep.

But Aurora did. For the first time in days, exhaustion dragged her under like a slow tide — and even then, her dreams were knives.

When she woke, the sky outside the safe house was a bruised gray. Elara was gone, leaving only a folded note on the counter.

> “He’s moving. You’ll find him where the mirrors lie.”

No signature. No hint of where or when. Just those words that felt like prophecy.

Aurora showered, dressed in black, and stared at her reflection in the cracked bathroom mirror. The woman staring back looked sharper than she remembered — colder, hungrier. Her eyes had lost the softness that once begged to be seen. They were steel now. Zane had forged her into something even he might not be able to control.

By the time she reached the warehouse district, the night had fallen hard — all neon haze and distant thunder. Her phone buzzed once, a hidden number flashing on the screen. She answered without thinking.

“Hello, little wolf.”

His voice.

Zane.

It slid through her veins like poison and honey, equal parts fury and longing. She gripped the steering wheel hard enough that her knuckles turned white.

“You’re alive,” she whispered.

A soft chuckle. “Disappointed?”

“I buried you,” she snapped. “I watched your company implode. I almost died cleaning up your mess.”

“And yet,” he said, voice dangerously calm, “here you are — chasing me through the dark. You should have stayed away.”

“I don’t run,” she said. “Not from you.”

A pause. Then: “Good. Because I’m tired of ghosts. Come find me, Aurora. Let’s finish what we started.”

The line went dead.

She sat there, the echo of his voice heavy in the silence. Then she drove — fast, reckless — following instinct more than direction. The address came to her only when she stopped at the old hotel near the docks. The place where everything had begun.

The building was half-shuttered, its windows black, its sign flickering like a heartbeat about to fail. She stepped inside. The air was thick with dust and memory — the scent of him, faint but undeniable, like smoke after a fire.

The elevator was dead. She took the stairs, her heels clicking like a countdown.

When she reached the penthouse level, the door was already open.

Zane stood by the window, back to her, city lights painting his silhouette in gold and shadow. He turned as if he’d been expecting her all along.

For a moment, her heart stopped.

He looked alive. Too alive. The same sharp suit, the same calculated arrogance — but there was something new in his eyes. Guilt, maybe. Or something darker.

“You faked your death,” she said. “You let me think you were gone.”

“I had to.” His voice was low, raw. “They would’ve killed you if they thought I still cared.”

“You don’t get to say that.” She stepped closer, fury tightening her chest. “You don’t get to pretend this was about me.”

He smiled — a small, tired curve of lips. “You think this was ever about anyone else?”

Her pulse stuttered. The space between them crackled like a live wire.

“I saw the files,” she whispered. “Project Lyra. You used me.”

“I protected you,” he corrected. “I kept you close because they wanted to break you. You were never supposed to find the vault. You weren’t supposed to turn the key.”

“Then why leave it for me?”

His eyes darkened. “Because I needed to know if you were still mine.”

The words hit her like a blow.

She should’ve walked out.

Instead, she took a slow step forward. “You don’t own me, Zane.”

He tilted his head. “Then why are you trembling?”

“I’m angry.”

“No,” he said softly, closing the distance between them. “You’re afraid of what you still feel.”

His hand brushed her jaw — the same spot as before — and every cell in her body betrayed her. The memory of his touch, his scent, the taste of his mouth — it all came roaring back, burning away the walls she’d built.

“I should hate you,” she breathed.

“Then hate me,” he whispered, leaning closer. “But do it while you’re still this close.”

And then he kissed her.

It wasn’t gentle. It was war.

Her hands slammed against his chest but didn’t push him away. His mouth claimed hers like a man starved, desperate, punishing. Every protest melted into heat, every breath became a surrender. When they finally broke apart, she was shaking — not from fear, but from the brutal truth of her own want.

“I thought I lost you,” she whispered, her forehead resting against his.

“You did,” he said. “And you found someone worse.”

“What are you planning, Zane?”

He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You’ll find out soon enough.”

“I won’t let you control me again.”

He stepped back, and for a heartbeat, the mask slipped — and she saw it. The pain. The guilt. The love that shouldn’t exist but refused to die.

“You already have,” he said quietly. “You think I’m the fire, Aurora, but you’re the match. You always were.”

Before she could answer, a sound cracked the night — a gunshot. The window behind Zane exploded, shards raining like glitter. He yanked her down behind the marble counter, covering her body with his.

“Stay down!” he hissed.

“Who—”

“Someone who doesn’t want this reunion to happen.”

Her heart raced as sirens wailed in the distance. He grabbed a small black drive from his pocket and pressed it into her palm.

“If I don’t make it out, you run. You don’t stop. That file has everything — every name, every secret. Finish what I couldn’t.”

“Zane—”

But he was already standing, gun drawn, eyes sharp with that lethal calm she remembered too well.

The door burst open. Shadows poured in.

And before Aurora could scream, before she could reach him — Zane stepped into the chaos.

The last thing she saw was the ghost of his smile, the one that always came before something burned.

And then — darkness.

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