LOSING HIM

# Chapter 7

The city looked different at two in the morning. Empty streets gleamed wet from earlier rain, and the buildings stood like silent witnesses to sins committed in darkness. Tia sat in the passenger seat of Dante's car, dressed in black tactical gear that Lucia had fitted for her, and tried to keep her breathing steady.

"Second thoughts?" Dante asked without looking at her.

"No."

"Liar."

She turned to face him. "I'm terrified. That's different from having second thoughts."

He glanced at her then, something like approval in his dark eyes. "Good. Fear keeps you sharp. Overconfidence gets you killed."

Marco's voice crackled through the radio clipped to Dante's vest. "In position. Guard rotation confirmed. You have a thirty-two minute window starting at oh-two-hundred hours."

Dante checked his watch. "Copy. Moving in four minutes."

The Harrington Pharmaceuticals building rose before them, all glass and steel and her father's legacy. Tia had walked through those doors a thousand times. She'd never imagined she'd be breaking in like a thief.

"The loading dock entrance," Dante said, pulling up the blueprint on a tablet. "Two cameras here and here, but there's a fifteen-second gap when the feeds switch. That's our entry point."

"And once we're inside?"

"We move fast and quiet. Your fingerprint gets us through the biometric locks. I handle anything else." He met her eyes. "If something goes wrong, you follow my lead. No heroics, no improvising. Understood?"

"I'm not an idiot."

"You're brave. That's close enough to get you killed." He powered off the tablet and tucked it away. "Stay behind me, stay quiet, and trust me."

Trust. Such a simple word for something that felt impossible a week ago. But as Tia looked at Dante's profile in the darkness, she realized she did trust him. With her life. Maybe with more than that.

"Two minutes," Marco's voice announced.

Dante opened his door. "Let's go."

They moved through the shadows like smoke, Dante in front with a confidence that came from years of breaking into places he shouldn't be. Tia followed, her heart hammering so hard she was sure the guards would hear it.

The loading dock was exactly as the blueprints showed—a wide entrance for trucks, a smaller door for personnel, and two cameras angled to cover both. Dante held up a hand, counting down silently with his fingers. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.

They sprinted across the open space. Tia's boots hit concrete with soft thuds that sounded deafening to her ears. Dante was already at the door, working on the lock with tools that looked too delicate for his hands.

Click.

The door swung open. They slipped inside just as the camera feeds switched back.

The interior was dark except for emergency lighting that cast everything in a sickly green glow. Tia oriented herself quickly—they were in the storage level, two floors below her father's executive offices where the private server was kept.

"Stairs or elevator?" she whispered.

"Stairs. Elevators create records." Dante moved toward the stairwell door. "Which way?"

"East corner."

They climbed in silence. Each floor they passed made Tia's nerves stretch tighter. At any moment, a guard could open a door, a motion sensor could trigger, a camera they'd missed could catch them.

But they made it to the executive floor without incident.

The hallway stretched before them, plush carpet muffling their footsteps, walls lined with portraits of her family's history. Her grandfather stared down at her from one frame, his expression stern and judgmental even in paint.

"The server room is at the end," Tia said. "Two doors—outer office, then the vault itself."

"Guards?"

"One stationed at the elevator. The server room should be empty this time of night."

Should be.

Dante drew a handgun from his shoulder holster. "Stay close."

They moved down the hallway. Tia's palms were sweating despite the cool air. Every shadow looked like a threat, every sound like approaching footsteps.

The outer office door was locked. Tia pressed her palm to the biometric reader, held her breath. Her fingerprint should still be active—she was still technically an executive, even if Julian had tried to paint her as a criminal.

Green light. Click.

Inside, the office was dark except for the glow of computer monitors on standby. Tia led Dante to the second door, the one that required both a keycard and fingerprint.

"I don't have my keycard," she said. "It was in my purse."

"Not a problem." Dante pulled out a blank keycard and a small device. "One of Enzo's toys. It'll clone any active card signature within range." He held it against the reader, waited for the light to flash, then swiped it.

Yellow light. Access denied.

"Shit." Dante tried again. Same result.

"They deactivated my access," Tia said, cold realization settling in her stomach. "Julian must have convinced my father I was a security risk."

"Then we do this the hard way." Dante examined the lock. "Marco, I need you to loop the cameras on executive level. Now."

"On it. You have five minutes max before security notices the loop."

"Five minutes." Dante pulled out more tools from a pouch on his vest. "I can work with that."

Tia watched him attack the lock with focused precision, his hands steady despite the ticking clock. Sweat beaded on his forehead. She wanted to help, to do something useful, but all she could do was stand there and watch the hallway.

Three minutes passed.

"Dante."

"Almost there."

Four minutes.

"We should go. It's not worth—"

The lock clicked.

Dante pulled the door open and gestured her through. "After you."

The server room was cold and humming with the sound of machines. Rows of servers blinked with activity, processing the company's data even in the dead of night. Tia went straight to the main terminal and started typing.

"What are you looking for?" Dante stood by the door, watching both her and the hallway beyond.

"Financial records, communications, anything that ties Julian to Kozlov." Her fingers flew over the keyboard. "My father keeps everything backed up here, even emails he thinks are deleted."

She navigated through folders, searching for Julian's name, for Kozlov, for Marcus. There—a folder labeled "Project Meridian."

Her family's drug formula.

She opened it and felt her blood run cold. Contracts. Proposed sales figures. Communications between Julian and shell companies she recognized from Enzo's research. And photos—of her, dated and annotated like she was a product being evaluated.

"Candidate shows appropriate naivety. Will be manageable post-marriage."

"Father is emotionally distant. Unlikely to interfere if properly manipulated."

"Security chief compromised. Full access to facilities confirmed."

Julian had been planning this for over a year. Before he'd even proposed. Every smile, every kiss, every moment she'd thought was real—calculated.

"Tia." Dante's voice was sharp. "D******d it and let's move."

She plugged in the drive Enzo had given her and started the transfer. The progress bar crawled across the screen with agonizing slowness.

Footsteps echoed in the hallway.

Dante's hand moved to his gun. "How long?"

"Two minutes."

"We don't have two minutes."

The footsteps grew louder. A guard, making rounds. Tia's heart slammed against her ribs.

Dante moved to the door and eased it shut, leaving just a crack to see through. The guard passed by the outer office, flashlight beam sweeping across the walls. He paused. Turned back.

Had he seen something? Noticed the door was unlocked?

The guard moved closer. His hand went to his radio.

Dante slipped out of the server room silently. Tia watched through the crack as he moved behind the guard like a shadow. One arm around the man's throat, cutting off his air and his ability to call for help. The guard struggled, but Dante held him until he went limp, then lowered him to the floor.

Not dead. Just unconscious.

Dante dragged the body into the outer office and returned to the server room. "Time?"

"Thirty seconds."

He watched the hallway, tense as a drawn bowstring. Tia counted down in her head. Twenty seconds. Ten.

The d******d completed.

She yanked the drive free and shoved it into her pocket. "Got it."

"Then we run."

They left the server room and nearly made it to the stairwell when voices erupted from the elevator.

"—checked in fifteen minutes ago. Something's wrong."

More guards. Coming right toward them.

Dante pulled her into a side office and pressed her against the wall, his body shielding hers from view through the frosted glass door. She could feel his heart beating against her back, could smell gunpowder and something darker on his clothes.

The guards passed by. Kept going.

"They'll find the unconscious one," Tia whispered.

"I know. We need to move now."

They ran for the stairs, Tia's lungs burning as they descended two steps at a time. Behind them, an alarm began to wail.

"All units, we have a security breach on executive level. Lock down all exits."

Dante grabbed her hand and pulled her faster. They burst out of the stairwell on the ground floor and sprinted toward the loading dock.

Guards appeared at the far end of the hallway.

"Stop!"

Dante didn't stop. He fired twice over his shoulder—not to hit, just to make them take cover—and shoved through the loading dock door.

The car was there, engine already running. Marco in the driver's seat.

They dove into the back seat and Marco gunned the engine before their doors were even closed. The car fishtailed out of the parking area as guards poured out of the building behind them.

"Drive," Dante ordered. "Don't stop for anything."

Marco took corners like a race car driver, weaving through empty streets until the Harrington building was far behind them. Only when they were certain no one was following did he slow to a normal speed.

Tia sat back, her whole body shaking with adrenaline. She pulled the drive from her pocket and held it up.

"We got it."

Dante looked at her, and slowly, impossibly, he smiled. "We did."

And then Tia started laughing. It bubbled up from somewhere deep, hysteria and relief and the sheer insanity of what they'd just done. She'd broken into her own family's company. She'd watched Dante knock a man unconscious. They'd been chased by armed guards.

And they'd won.

Dante watched her laugh, something warm flickering in his eyes. Then, as if he couldn't help himself, he reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

The touch was gentle. Almost tender.

Tia's laughter died. They stared at each other in the dark back seat, the moment stretching between them like a live wire.

"You did well," he said quietly.

"I was terrified the entire time."

"I know. You did it anyway." His hand was still near her face, close enough that she could feel the heat of it. "That's what courage is."

The car turned onto the road leading to the estate. The moment broke.

Dante pulled his hand back and turned to look out the window. But Tia could still feel where he'd touched her, could still see that warm flicker in his eyes before he'd hidden it away.

Something had shifted between them tonight. Something dangerous and inevitable.

When they reached the estate, Enzo was waiting in the study with equipment ready to analyze the drive. Lucia brought coffee that Tia drank gratefully, even though her hands still shook.

"Let's see what we have," Enzo said, plugging in the drive.

Files began appearing on the screen. Contracts. Emails. Financial records. Everything they needed to prove Julian's conspiracy.

And there, in a folder marked "Final Phase," a document that made Tia's blood run cold.

"Insurance Policy—Celestia Harrington."

She opened it.

Inside was a detailed plan for her death, made to look like suicide. The timing. The method. The fake evidence of depression and instability that Julian had been carefully planting for months.

He'd planned to kill her six days after the wedding. As soon as the legal paperwork was finalized and he had full access to her assets.

"He was going to murder me," Tia said, her voice hollow. "In our honeymoon suite. Make it look like I jumped from the balcony."

Dante stood behind her, reading over her shoulder. His hands clenched into fists.

"He's a dead man."

"No." Tia closed the file and turned to face him. "We do this the right way. We destroy him with his own evidence, then we hand him to the authorities."

"The right way gets him twenty years. My way gets him a grave."

"Your way makes me a murderer." Tia met his eyes. "I won't become that. Not even for revenge."

The room was silent. Everyone watching them, waiting to see who would win this argument.

Dante stared at her for a long moment. Then, slowly, he nodded.

"Your choice. Your call." He turned to Enzo. "Copy everything. Triple redundancy. I want this evidence backed up so securely that even if Julian burns down the world, it survives."

"Already on it."

Tia sagged against the desk, exhaustion finally catching up with her. It was done. They had the evidence. Julian's whole conspiracy, documented in his own words.

They had him.

Dante appeared beside her with a glass of water. "Drink. Then sleep. We've got work to do tomorrow."

"What work?"

"Watching Julian's world burn." He handed her the glass. "You earned that much."

Tia drank, then looked up at him. In the harsh fluorescent light of the study, she could see the exhaustion on his face too, the tension in his shoulders from the night's work.

"Thank you," she said. "For tonight. For all of this."

"Thank me when it's over." But his expression softened slightly. "You should rest. Tomorrow we plan his destruction."

She wanted to say more. Wanted to acknowledge what had passed between them in the car. But Enzo was there, and Lucia, and Marco, and the moment wasn't theirs.

So she just nodded and left, feeling Dante's eyes on her back the whole way.

In her room, she lay in the darkness and thought about his hand near her face, that gentle touch that said more than words could.

Something was growing between them. Something that had nothing to do with their deal and everything to do with who they were becoming together.

It terrified her more than any of Julian's plans ever had.

Because losing this—losing him—would hurt far worse than anything her ex-fiancé could have done.