NO DAUGHTERS, ONLY WEAPONS

ALANA

My father didn’t raise a daughter.

He raised a weapon.

A beautiful, obedient, silent little weapon dressed in sundresses and smiles.

He made sure I knew the difference.

There are no real girls in this world. No softness. No innocence. Just trained dolls with sharp tongues and dead eyes, conditioned to smile through every command, every deal, every kill.

That’s what I was made for.

Not for falling in love with the enemy.

Not for Zach.

He hasn’t said it out loud. But he doesn’t need to.

Roman knows.

Not everything. Not yet. But enough.

I can feel it in the way he looks at me now, like I’m some cracked vase on a shelf. Decorative. Dangerous. Easily discarded.

He hasn’t hit me since I was thirteen. Not physically. But my father never needed fists to hurt me. His voice is enough. His silence is worse.

“Sit,” he says now, gesturing to the leather chair across from his desk.

The office smells like cigar smoke and metal. A fire crackles in the hearth behind him, not for warmth, just for the illusion of control. He always liked things that burn.

I smooth my dress and sit, hands folded in my lap like I was taught.

“You’ve been disobedient,” he begins, voice calm, measured. That’s when he’s most lethal, when he sounds like a man reading scripture.

“You gave me a week,” I say softly. “It hasn’t been seven days.”

“You’re missing the point.”

He pours himself a glass of bourbon, neat, and doesn’t offer me any. Not that I’d drink it. I’ve learned better than to take anything from Roman’s hand unless I know where it came from and what it cost.

He lifts the glass, swirls the amber liquid.

 “This boy, Zachary Pierce. Or should I say… Zakhar Veronin?”

The air leaves my lungs.

“Where did you hear that?” I ask.

He lifts a brow.

“You thought I wouldn’t find out? You think I wouldn’t recognize the last name of the man who tried to take half my city fifteen years ago?”

I say nothing. Because now, there’s nothing I can say.

Veronin.

Zach.

It all makes sense now.

Why Roman was so quick to demand I cut him off.

Why the men in the shadows have been moving like vultures around the South District.

Zach doesn’t know yet. He doesn’t realize what that name means.

But my father does. And if Zach’s not careful, that name will be the last thing he ever learns about himself.

“You’ve seen him recently?” Roman asks.

I hesitate.

“Yes.”

“Is he aware of who he is?”

“No.”

“Is he a threat?”

“No,” I say again, this time louder.

“He’s not like that.”

He watches me for a long, long time. Then he leans forward, both elbows on the desk, and his voice drops to a whisper.

“Alana, listen very carefully to what I am about to say. The only reason that boy is still breathing is because I don’t know how useful he might be. The second, the second, he becomes a liability, I will have him erased. Do you understand?”

I nod once. My face is still. My posture perfect. My voice doesn’t shake when I say,

“Yes, sir.”

But inside, I am breaking.

Roman doesn’t dismiss me. Not yet.

He stands slowly and walks to the fireplace, drink still in hand. His shoulders relax. His tone softens.

“You were born into this world, Alana. We didn’t choose it. But we don’t get to leave it either.”

I want to scream. But instead I smile. The mask clicks into place like muscle memory.

“I know.”

“You’ve always been smart.” He turns and looks at me. “You’ve always understood the cost.”

I rise to leave.

He speaks again just as I reach the door.

“If he means anything to you, you’ll stay away from him. It’s the only way to keep him alive.”

And just like that, I’m dismissed.

The house is a cage made of gold.

Security guards at every corner. Cameras in the halls. Fences so tall they scrape the sky. But the real bars are the invisible ones, the rules, the orders, the bloodlines.

I go to my room and shut the door behind me.

Then I sink to the floor and press my face to my knees. I don’t cry. I don’t scream.

I just sit in the silence and try not to think about the fact that I might be the one who puts a bullet in Zach’s chest if I don’t figure this out.

I met him by accident. But loving him wasn’t one.

It happened slowly, then all at once.

The way he looks at me like I’m not made of knives.

The way he holds my hand like he doesn’t notice the blood on it.

The way he never asks me for more than I can give—but always sees what I’m not saying.

I should have stayed away. I didn’t.

Now I don’t know how to unlove him.

Later that night, I sneak out.

I know how to move through the house without triggering the sensors. I know how to take the side exit and kill the feed for thirty seconds so the cameras loop. I’ve done this before. For missions. For meetings.

This is the first time I’ve done it for my heart.

Zach’s place is quiet when I get there.

He opens the door shirtless, hair messy, sleep still in his eyes. But the second he sees my face, he sobers.

“What happened?” he asks.

“I just needed to see you.”

He doesn’t question it. Just pulls me inside and locks the door behind me. He doesn’t try to kiss me, doesn’t ask anything else, just grabs a blanket and sits beside me on the couch like we’ve always belonged in this room.

It makes me want to cry and scream and tell him everything.

But I don’t.

Instead, I rest my head on his shoulder and whisper, “Do you believe in fate?”

He thinks for a second. “I believe in choice.”

“What if someone else made the choice before you were even born?”

He doesn’t answer right away.

Then:

“Then it’s your job to take it back.”

That’s what I want. To take it back. To undo this whole legacy of blood and betrayal. To stop being a weapon.

But how do you dismantle a system that built you?

How do you protect the boy you love from the people who raised you to kill?

I curl tighter into him, fingers laced with his, and tell myself I’ll find a way.

Even if it breaks me.

Because I wasn’t made to love. But I do.

And I will not lose him to the name he never asked for.