All Chapters of THE COST OF SAVING HIM : Chapter 41 - Chapter 47

The morning after Kane left felt longer than it should have.I wandered. Not with a destination, just moving through rooms because staying still felt worse. The new house was different from the last one — slightly smaller, slightly warmer somehow, though still far too large for the number of people actually living in it. I passed through the sitting room, looked out a window for a while, walked back through the hallway, and generally accomplished nothing useful for about an hour.Then I noticed the kitchen door was open.I almost walked past it. Then a smell reached me and I stopped completely — warm and sweet and familiar in a way that had nothing to do with expensive houses or security rotations or any of the past few weeks. It smelled like something my mother used to make on slow Sunday mornings, something that belonged to a version of life that felt very far away right now.I stood in the doorway for a moment. Inside, one of the older housekeepers was working at the counter, her h

Nadia's POVThe afternoon had been unusually peaceful. The house was quiet, most of the staff having returned to their work after lunch, leaving only the occasional sound of footsteps echoing through the long hallways. I stood near the living room window looking out at the garden, not thinking about anything in particular, just looking.The silence didn't feel uncomfortable anymore, not exactly. I was beginning to understand how the house breathed — every employee moving with purpose, nobody raising their voice, nobody asking unnecessary questions, even the security guards outside changing shifts without disturbing the calm. I wrapped my arms around myself and sighed. Maybe I should read. Maybe I should go back to the kitchen. Maybe—A sharp crack echoed from outside.I frowned. Another followed, louder, then another, and my heart skipped before my brain had caught up. Fireworks? No. The realization landed almost instantly, cold and certain.Gunshots.Someone screamed downstairs. A se

The recording light flashed.Then before he could finish the sentence, gunshots erupted through the warehouse.The door exploded inward.Nadia barely had time to register what was happening before something warm and wet hit her face and chest, and for one terrifying second she thought it was her own blood, thought maybe she'd been hit and hadn't felt it yet, her body going rigid with shock. Then she saw the man beside her — the older man, the one who'd been smiling into the camera — collapse sideways onto the concrete floor, and she understood. It wasn't her blood. It was his.The room descended into chaos immediately. Gunfire echoed off the concrete walls from every direction, sharp and overlapping, and Nadia screamed without meaning to, twisting against the restraints as bodies moved fast around her, shouting, falling, fighting. Through the smoke and noise she caught a flash of a familiar figure moving with brutal precision through the room — Kane, his expression unreadable even now