LOGINThe Will sat on my kitchen table like a confession no one wanted to explain.Daniel’s name was printed neatly at the top. The date – yesterday. The same day he had walked into the police station and confessed to arson as calmly as if he were ordering coffee.I stared at it until the words blurred.Swiss account. Numbered. Anonymous.Preparing to flee.That was the story the document told. Clean and logicalI pressed my palms flat against the paper, as if I could force it to change. As if I could squeeze another meaning out of it. But the truth, at least the version staring back at me, was simple.Daniel had planned an exit.While I stood here, defending him. While my nonprofit bled donors and trust. While Pierce smiled on television and called Daniel “a tragic cautionary tale.”I laughed once, sharp and hollow. “Of course,” I whispered to the empty room. “Of course you did.”The kettle screamed on the stove. I’d forgotten I’d turned it on. I shut it off and let the silence rush back i
I still didn’t understand why Daniel surrendered.The question sat in my chest like a stone, heavy and unmoving, from the moment the news alerts exploded across my phone. Every channel. Every headline.BILLIONAIRE CONFESSES TO ARSON.DANIEL LOGAN TURNS HIMSELF IN.I stood in my kitchen, the kettle screaming on the stove, forgotten. The room smelled faintly of burnt metal. My hands were shaking so badly I had to grip the counter just to stay upright.Why?He could have run. He had the money. The connections. The exits. Daniel Logan never cornered himself, ever. And yet, there he was, walking calmly into handcuffs, as if this was exactly where he meant to be.The image replayed in my mind over and over. His eyes, steady. Almost gentle. And the way his mouth formed that single word for me as they led him away.Run.The kettle boiled dry before I even noticed.The detention facility I went to was cold in a way that had nothing to do with temperature. Everything echoed: footsteps, voices,
“This isn’t a threat,” Aaron had said. “It’s an execution.”Those words followed me into the building.They clung to my skin, my breath, and my thoughts as I pushed past the broken entrance and stepped inside.The building smelled like old smoke and wet concrete.That was the first thing that hit me as I stepped inside – not fire, not danger, but memory. Burned paper. Rusted metal. A place that had already died once and refused to stay buried.My pulse thudded in my ears as I moved deeper into the structure, every footstep echoing too loudly. The flashlight in my hand trembled, cutting through dust and shadows. This was the building Pierce was supposed to destroy again.The past, erased twice.I swallowed and checked my phone. No signal. Of course.The investigator had stayed outside, insisting this part was too risky. I hadn’t argued. Some truths felt like they were meant to be faced alone.That was when I saw the gasoline cans.Three of them. Bright red. Carefully lined up near the
I told my father I would be back.The words tasted hollow as I said them, like a promise made with fingers crossed behind my back. He lay there in the hospital bed, smaller than I remembered, his eyes tired but sharp with fear.He nodded, squeezing my hand as if he wanted to hold me there, to keep me from walking straight into whatever fire Pierce was planning next.“I need to stop him,” I said quietly. My father swallowed. “Be careful, Jane.”I didn’t trust myself to answer, so I just turned and left.The moment the hospital doors slid shut behind me, the weight crashed down again. Pierce is planning another fire. The words replayed in my head, over and over, like a match striking again and again, refusing to go out.I should have gone straight to Daniel.That was the logical choice. He had the resources. The connections. The experience of fighting Pierce and surviving it. And yet, as I stood in the parking lot, keys shaking in my hand, doubt crept in.What if Pierce was right?What
Daniel frowned slightly. “That was your dad, right? What did he say?”I looked at him, feeling the air shift around us, heavy with the weight of everything unsaid.“He wants to talk,” I whispered. “He says he needs to tell me the truth.”Daniel then nodded. “You should. I’ll go with you.”I shook my head. “No. I need to do this alone.”He opened his mouth to argue, but I lifted a hand, stopping him. My chest tightened as the words pushed out of me, low and shaky.“Daniel… you’re still hiding something from me.”His face fell. “Jane…”“No,” I said softly. “Don’t deny it. I can feel it. And whatever it is… it’s sitting between us like a wall I can’t climb.”He swallowed hard, guilt flickering across his eyes.“This thing with my mother, with Pierce, with
The confusion clung to me like fog as Daniel and I stood in the middle of my living room, staring at the sheet of paper lying on my desk – the missing page.The one someone had broken into my home to deliver. A message. A threat. A warning. I didn’t know which.My pulse hammered. Daniel stepped closer, gently touching my arm. “Jane… we should read it.”I wasn’t ready. I was terrified of whatever truth waited on that page. But I nodded, because we had already gone too far to turn back.I picked it up with trembling fingers.My mother’s handwriting, the soft, looping cursive I recognized from childhood notes tucked into lunchboxes and birthday cards, stared back at me.And from the very first sentence, my world cracked open.The missing page explained everything. Everything I was never supposed to know. Everything that destroyed my family long before I understood there was anything to break.I sank onto the sofa as the words burned into me:“If the warehouse ever goes up in flames, it w







