LOGINGabriel POVWe pulled through the gates of the compound at eight fifteen. The Bangria residence was nothing like the Wrenfield townhouse in Crescent Harbour. This was a walled estate on three acres in the Highfields district, surrounded by reinforced perimeter fencing, monitored by thirty-six cameras, and staffed by a security team of twelve. The house itself was a sprawling modernist structure of concrete and glass, designed by an architect who'd been told to make it look like a home and had instead produced something that looked like a very elegant bunker.I preferred it that way. Homes could be broken into. Bunkers could not.Mrs Tanner was waiting at the kitchen door. She was a stout Bangria woman in her sixties with silver-streaked hair pulled back in a tight bun and an expression of permanent disapproval that softened only when she was cooking, which was most of the time. She'd been with me for eleven years, outlasting three security chiefs, two accountants, and one assassinatio
Gabriel POVWe drove in silence for a few minutes. The highway merged into the Bangria central district, where the buildings grew taller, the streets grew narrower, and the energy shifted from industrial sprawl to the compressed intensity of a city that never quite decided whether it was thriving or collapsing."Where's Rowan now?" I asked.Leo hesitated. That was unusual. Leo didn't hesitate."We don't have a confirmed location.""You had surveillance on him when he left Crescent Harbour.""We did. He flew private to Lisaro, stayed for eighteen hours, then dropped off the grid. The last confirmed sighting was at the Lisaro port four days ago. Since then, nothing. His phone's dead. His known associates have scattered. The safe houses we identified in Bangria are empty.""All of them?""All seven. Cleared out. Not hastily. Methodically. Furniture removed, communications equipment taken, not a single fingerprint left behind. Whoever cleaned those sites had time and training."Rowan was
Gabriel POVThe flight from Crescent Harbour to Bangria was four hours and sixteen minutes. I spent the first hour going through financial reports, trying to read as much as I could with my dull brain. Rowan used to do all of these for me and explain them carefully afterwards.The second hour reviewing surveillance feeds from three properties. The third hour staring at the back of the seat in front of me, thinking about the way Evelyn's hair had looked spread across her pillow in the dark.The fourth hour I spent being angry at myself for wasting the third.Leo met me at the private terminal. He was standing by the armoured SUV with a tablet in one hand and an expression on his face that told me the news wasn't good. Leo had been with me for six years, and I'd learned to read his face the way most people read headlines. A slightly raised right eyebrow meant a logistical problem. Jaw tight meant a personnel issue. Both hands behind his back meant someone was dead.Today, his jaw was ti
Evelyn POVThe question cracked something open inside me. Not because it was angry, demanding, or wounded. Because it was hopeful.Despite everything. Despite last night, despite the doorstep, despite the pharmacy, despite the twelve minutes of silence in which he'd driven me home from buying a pill to prevent another man's child. Despite all of that, Vincent was sitting in his car asking me if there was room.I opened my mouth to answer."You know what," he said, cutting me off. His voice had changed as if every word was being pushed through a space that kept narrowing. "Don't answer that. I'm not sure I want to hear it right now.""Vincent...""No, I think I need to say this." He let go of the steering wheel. His hands dropped to his lap, and he stared at them as if they belonged to someone else. "I have been patient, Evelyn. I have been so patient. I told you how I felt. I put myself out there in a way I have never done with anyone else. I asked you for a chance, a real chance, and
Evelyn POVThe silence that followed was unlike any silence I'd experienced in his presence.Every other quiet moment between us had been comfortable, natural, the pause between two people who didn't need words to fill every second. This silence was different. For one, it was clear that I'd slept with Gabriel. There was no other logical explanation, because why else would I need a postpill? To cure a headache?He didn't ask me to explain. He didn't ask who. He didn't ask when. He just drove, his eyes fixed on the road, both hands on the wheel, his jaw set in a line so tight I could see the muscle jumping beneath his skin.I kept my face turned toward the window. My cheeks were burning hot. I was surprised the glass wasn't fogging.We drove the rest of the way to the pharmacy in total silence.The pharmacy was a small, clean Wellcare on the corner of Third and Maple. As soon as we arrived, I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for the door handle."I'll be quick," I said, without looking
Evelyn POVI climbed into the passenger seat and pulled the door shut behind me. The interior of Vincent's car smelled like fresh leather and that clean, woodsy cologne he always wore. The one that was nothing like Gabriel's darker, heavier scent. The one that was still, if I was being honest with myself, faintly present on my skin from twelve hours ago.I buckled my seatbelt without looking at him.He pulled away from the kerb without saying another word to me. His hands at ten and two, his eyes on the road, his profile calm and composed in a way that would have been reassuring if the silence between us didn't feel like it weighed four hundred pounds.We drove for two full minutes without speaking.The morning traffic was light. Suburban streets gave way to the main road, and the storefronts of Wrenfield's small commercial strip slid past the windows. A woman walking a terrier. A man opening the shutters on a bakery. The world was going about its Tuesday morning as if nothing extraor
Evelyn POVTwo weeks later.Two weeks of lying in my bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to convince myself that everything would somehow work out. Two weeks of ignoring Vincent's calls, his texts, his attempts to see me. Two weeks of pretending that the world hadn't shifted on its axis and left me
Evelyn POV“Let’s begin with the data,” he said. “We’ll start with stock volatility.”A chart lit up behind him, showing peaks and dips over the past six weeks.Gerald leaned forward, folding his hands.“Miss Bennett, since the announcement of your leadership transition, the company’s stock has sho
Evelyn POVI went back into my office and sat down again, feeling more miserable than I had moments before.I'd lost my company. And now I was losing Grace.The door opened again without a knock.Adrian stepped inside, closing the door quietly behind him. He was still wearing his suit jacket, looki
Evelyn POV“Yes. Stand beside a man. Adrian is still pursuing you. That alone should tell you something.”"A friend of mine casually mentioned that you've been offending a lot of key players in the business space in Crescent Harbour," she continued, moving closer to my bed. "She thinks it might hav







