Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 51 - Chapitre 60

(Aria's Point Of View)The encrypted drive digs into the palm of my hand through the fabric of my jacket as the van rumbles down the rutted dirt road leading to the silo. The cheap digital watch strapped to my wrist ticks down from one hour forty seven minutes, each second a tiny, sharp thud against my pulse. Dante’s good arm is wrapped tight around my waist, his grip so firm I can feel the tension in his muscles through both our layers of clothes, and he has not said a single word in the last ten minutes. I know he is still fighting the urge to lock me in the back of the van and take my place. I also know I would climb out the window and walk the rest of the way if he tried.Isabella’s voice crackles through the comms unit tucked in my ear, sharp and steady as always. “Thermal scans show twelve hostiles on the surface level, plus automated turrets mounted on the silo roof. Motion sensors line the entire perimeter fence, calibrated to pick up anything larger than a rabbit. Elara’s acc

(Aria's Point Of View)My boot skids on a patch of oil slick concrete as I round the corner, the sharp crack of gunfire ringing in my ears. The countdown hums in the back of my head, steady and unforgiving. Eight minutes forty seven seconds until the core blows. Eight minutes to get Elena and Natasha to the maintenance shaft, to get Dante out alive, to make sure Nikolai does not walk away from this silo with the power to hold the whole planet hostage.Elena’s voice cuts through the noise again, sharp with fear but steady, the same tone she used to use when she talked me down from panic attacks after Lorenzo’s threats. “Aria! We are over here, behind the supply crates!”I dart across the open stretch of corridor, Dante right on my heels, his gun firing over my shoulder at the soldier leaning out from a doorway further down. The man grunts and crumples, and I skid to a stop behind the stack of rusted metal crates where Mikhail has Elena and Natasha pressed flat to the concrete. Mikhail’

(Aria's Point Of View)The first thing I register is the beep. Steady, high, unrelenting, drilling straight into the throbbing ache at the back of my skull. The second is the smell: sharp, chemical antiseptic, the faint sweetness of old flowers on a nearby table, the familiar undercurrent of Elena’s lavender hand cream that must have rubbed off on my jacket when we hugged after the rescue.I try to lift my hand to touch the bump on my head, and my fingers catch on thin cotton hospital sheets and an IV line taped to the inside of my wrist. My eyes flutter open, and the room swims for a second before settling into sharp, too-bright focus. Pale blue walls, a heart monitor beside the bed, a window covered in thin vertical blinds that let in streaks of weak afternoon sun.My first coherent thought is for the baby.I fumble with the thin hospital gown, pressing my palm flat to my stomach, waiting for some sign that something is wrong. A soft, familiar flutter answers me, small and faint but

(Aria's Point Of View)The fake key drive digs into the meat of my palm as I sit in the back of the unmarked van, the plastic warm from being clamped in my fist for the last twenty minutes. The comms unit tucked in my ear hums soft and quiet, Isabella’s voice cutting through the static every few seconds with position updates for Mikhail and Alexei, who are perched on the warehouse rooftops surrounding the meeting point. Viktor’s extraction team is parked three blocks away, engines idling, ready to move the second I give the word.I run a finger along the hilt of the knife taped to my ankle, the one Elena slipped me in the hospital, and press my free hand light to my stomach. The baby flutters once, soft and steady, a quiet reminder of exactly what I am fighting for. Clara thinks I am here to cave. She thinks I will hand over the keys to save Dante and run, too scared of losing him to think through the consequences. She does not know I have not survived this long by choosing only one t

(Aria's Point Of View)Mikhail slams Kira into the van’s metal wall hard enough to make the first aid kit rattle off its shelf, his forearm pressed to her throat, his face blank of every emotion except cold, burning rage. Kira, the woman who spent two weeks pretending to be his dead sister Natasha, just smirks up at him, blood trickling from the cut on her lip where he backhanded her ten seconds prior. She does not look scared. She looks proud of how thoroughly she fooled all of us.“Tell me how long,” Mikhail says, his voice so flat it barely carries over the distant wail of sirens. “Tell me how long you practiced her laugh, her stories, the way she used to twist her hair when she was nervous. Tell me how long you let me grieve a woman I thought was finally home.”Kira laughs, a rough, breathless sound. “Every second of every day for two years. I watched old home videos your mother hid in a storage unit until I could recite them in my sleep. I practiced twisting my hair until my wris